


Aguamenti

by derasorea



Category: Free!, Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe, Crossover, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-11-05
Updated: 2014-01-04
Packaged: 2017-12-31 14:19:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 37,996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1032684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/derasorea/pseuds/derasorea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Except for the Nanases and the Tachibanas, everyone thinks Nanase Haruka is strange. He's too quiet, too creative with his hands, too odd around water. He wants nothing more than be left alone and be considered ordinary. One day, he accidentally makes a swimming pool boil and is told he's a wizard. From then on, nothing is ever the same.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Boy Who Dived

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> High Speed!, Free! S01E01, and PS Ch 1 parallels.

People in the harbortown of Iwatobi thought Nanase Haruka was a strange boy. He did not speak much, he very rarely smiled, and he smelled of chlorine and mackerel every day _._  There were only two families in the town who did not think Haruka was unusual at all: first, his own, and second, the Tachibanas, who had long understood and given in to Haruka's odd wishes. The boy kindly requested to sleep in the family's bathtub once during a sleepover, and Makoto's mother promptly prepared the tub and a water pillow for him, plus a mackerel-and-tomato salad for a midnight snack. Haruka was best friends since kindergarten with Makoto, the Tachibanas' eldest son.

Tall for his age, considerate, and sensible, Makoto had bright green eyes and a keen understanding of Haruka's mind. He was a very kind boy. He never really thought of Haruka as strange even if his friend had the habit of getting into any body of liquid large enough for him to soak in. (Why, Haruka once dipped his feet into Sasaki-san's three-legged iron pot, claiming his soles were feeling dry. Makoto whisked him right away in panic. That day, the Sasakis thought their chicken stock tasted funny.) Instead, Makoto felt his friend was special, and noted that Haruka could be unbelievably reckless and graceful both with water when left alone.

Understanding at a young age Haruka's connection with water, Makoto had suggested that they join the town's swim club together.

"I can swim in the pool all day?" Haruka asked. He had neat black hair and a rather solemn face, and his eyes were a distinct bluish-steel. They were in first grade then, painting egg shells during art class.

"No, Haru, not all day," Makoto whispered back, marveling at the beautiful scale pattern Haruka was making on his eggshell. Earlier, Makoto had tried to copy Haruka, but he held his eggshell too tightly in his hand and it broke. He contented himself with painting only green and yellow spots on the replacement eggshell their teacher gave him. "Only during practice hours. But you get to swim most days somewhere bigger than a bathtub or inflatable pool. Fun, right?"

"I only swim free."

"You can swim freestyle, that'd be no problem. Dad said we'd be paying a bit of a membership fee and buy our own swimming gear, though. But he said it's okay with him and Mom—"

"I can really swim in the pool all day?"

"Haru, I think you're not listening to me," Makoto sighed. "I was talking about—"

"All right. I'm in."

They'd been swimming in the club and joining school tournaments since.

 

 

 

 

One Saturday afternoon in July, Haruka and Makoto were walking home from the Iwatobi Swim Club after practice. Haruka seemed troubled as they walked across the town port to Misagozaki Shrine, and Makoto wondered why.

"Ah, Haru. About the tournament," Makoto said cheerfully, feeling there was something about the upcoming August prefecturals that was bothering Haruka. "I'm feeling nervous," he said, looking straight ahead at the sea kissed golden by the afternoon sun. "We're in sixth grade, which means it's our last chance to win. If only _—_ "

"Makoto." Haruka stopped walking.  _Sasabe's dismayed because I'm not joining the prefecturals. Today's my last practice_. "I quit the swim club."

Makoto screamed.

Haruka's brow furrowed. Makoto was probably disappointed or angry, or both, at what he did, but to make such a fuss and call the attention of fishermen hauling their boats nearby was senseless and distasteful. He turned around, his face cold but careful, cutting words forming on his tongue _...  
_

But Makoto was not beside him. His friend was sprinting toward the sea.

It wasn't him that caused Makoto to shout. The sea was a beautiful liquid gold today and his mind was busy that he did not notice a girl in the water.

She was motionless and wide-eyed, about to drown.

 

 

 

 

Makoto feared the sea.

A summer storm years ago had killed a fisherman that was Makoto's friend from the next town, and many others also perished that night. Yet, Haruka thought as he ran to their aid as well, his friend was almost there now, dashing intrepidly _,_ to rescue someone from the waters that once stole sleep from him.

He felt a wave of pride. He was also irritated beyond capacity. _Why is that girl in there alone?_

Still, he was relieved when he saw the girl safe in the shore with Makoto drenched and breathing heavily beside her.

"It's okay. It's okay, you're safe now," he heard Makoto say.

"Thank you for saving me," the girl sniffled. She looked about their age, with greenish-brown hair like Makoto's and amber eyes.

Makoto smiled, but Haruka noticed how pale he had turned. "No problem. What's your name?"

"I'm Hitomi."

"Okay, Hitomi," Makoto said. "Just don't go back to the sea with no one to look after you, okay? Did you come here alone?" When Hitomi nodded, Makoto looked out at the sea nervously.

"How irresponsible," Haruka said. Makoto looked surprised to see that he followed. "Haru?"

Probably it was the flatness in his voice or the displeased look in his face, Haruka thought, that caused Hitomi to edge closer to Makoto, stare down at the sand, and keep very, very quiet. She even stopped crying.

Haruka looked at Makoto. "You, as well. Running off alone like that without telling me what you saw, or calling the fishermen for help."

Makoto scratched his head. "Well, I shouted somehow, and yet nobody else noticed or came except you," he reasoned.

Haruka thought he had a point there. Why didn't anybody else come? He looked around. Nobody seemed to be paying attention to them.

"Sorry, Haru. I just wanted to help."

He knew that. "We're not superheroes or wizards, Makoto."

"Yeah, I know. I'll be more careful," Makoto smiled, reading into Haruka's thoughts. Makoto knew he had simply been worried. Haruka was a quiet person, but he was very direct to the point and could be quite harsh when agitated.

Haruka walked over to Hitomi and said, a little more softly: "Why were you swimming alone?" He knelt to meet the girl's eyes and draped his club jacket over her shivering shoulders. He combed his bag, pulled his last remaining clean towel, and handed it to Makoto.

"I was _—_ I was looking for my necklace," Hitomi replied.

Haruka and Makoto looked at one another.

"A necklace?" Makoto asked. "What kind?"

"It had a pearl in it," Hitomi answered, fidgeting with the inflatable armbands she had on. "I think it was lost around" _—_ Hitomi pointed to a distance Haruka estimated to be fifty meters away from the shore _—_ "there".

"Wait," she said again. "I think I lost it there." She stretched out a hand and squinted. "Farther away."

"You should have asked your parents to come," Haruka censured.

Hitomi squirmed in Haruka's jacket. "M-mother forbade me to return here. I just wanted to see a light from the water, I see it from our house everyday, it was very near to the shore at first, you see... I didn't realize I was going to the middle of the sea, I mean the light was  _moving_ , I was just following _—_ "

"You went to the water to follow a  _light_?" Makoto asked, surprised.

"I don't like liars," Haruka said.

"I'm not lying! I swear I had the necklace earlier!"

Haruka keenly looked at her.

"You're from the swim club," Hitomi said, touching Haruka's jacket. "W-will you _—_  will you help me, please? I just need that necklace back."

 _Too much effort_ , Haruka thought, but then he found himself taking his shirt off and wading to the sea, his feet and skin tingling upon contact with the saltwater. "Wait here with her, Makoto."

 

 

 

 

Haruka found the pearl necklace lodged deep between two crevices. He immediately frowned, however, when he saw people other than Makoto or Hitomi waiting by the shore. Suddenly there seemed to be a lot more people there.

In fact, Haruka realized as he got closer, it looked like half of Iwatobi was waiting for him.

 

 

 

 

"Haru!" said Makoto, running to him and flinging his long arms over his shoulders. "You're all right!" He laughed shakily as he looked back at the aghast onlookers and said "I told you, Haru was okay!"

Haruka realized the skies had been a much deeper crimson when he got out of the water, and looked around. A five-man group of tall, muscular men in black shirts looked at him in confusion and exchanged heated remarks with two policemen. The fishermen from the port were there now also, looking at him like he's a strange, new fish they'd caught. Women and children alike shared expressions of fear, awe, or amusement, muttering and glancing at him repeatedly. Makoto's twin siblings, Ran and Ren, waved at him happily. Makoto's parents were there, too, as were his own: his mother looked calm, while his father looked like he wanted to throw everyone into the sea. Hitomi was gone.

Haruka's mother, Nanase Neri, hugged her son. She draped a towel over Haruka's head and rubbed his hair. "My, now I want to swim, too."

"Mom?" The tight grasp Haruka had on the necklace loosened as he awkwardly hugged his mother back. He was confused still. "Why are you here?"

"You've been in the water for three hours, Haru," Haruka's mother replied, her brilliant blue eyes gazing at her son fondly. "A little girl kept saying 'The boy who dived has died.' It was nonsense, I said, I told them you were safe, but they would not listen to me or Makoto."

Haruka looked back and forth at his mother and best friend. "I've been underwater for three  _hours_?"

 

 

 


	2. The Green Pool

Night had fallen over Iwatobi, but Haruka was still bewildered. His father was furious with him. The distinguished, clever, and imperturbable Nanase Hisoka, a man of few words and fewer facial expressions _,_ had shown emotion toward him. Haruka allowed himself the tiniest of smiles.

There was the issue of his "drowning" at sea. Haruka felt he was gone for only five minutes, but people maintained he was away for hours. According to Makoto, it was Hitomi, going into a fit and fearing she had drowned him, who asked help from the beach rescue team. The team insisted that they conducted a thorough search of the area Hitomi and Makoto pointed he was at, and Haruka swore he didn't stray too far. Why didn't they meet underwater? And Hitomi, Hitomi just disappeared.

"Maybe she already went home so her mother wouldn't be mad," Makoto had said. "I kept my eyes on the water, waiting for you. The last time I saw her was when she returned with the men in black. Sorry, I told her you'd be okay, but she wouldn't listen to me."

The police claimed the pearl necklace.

Hisoka paced their living room in silent fury, and Haruka noticed his father's face had a strange ashen hue. It was as if he didn't dare breathe for hours until Haruka got out of the water safely, and he still wasn't breathing now.

"I told you, Haruka! Never swim in the open sea!"

Of all the people in Haruka's life—and there admittedly were only a very few—only his father could call Haruka by his whole first name and not get a sullen look or a bitter rebuke from Haruka himself.

People said that Haruka inherited his mother's jet-black hair and blue eyes, but was Hisoka come again in temperament. Hisoka was a grave-looking man. He had short dark hair speckled with grey, and had sharp, black eyes. He always wore black-rimmed square glasses, but like Haruka, seldom wore a smile on his face.

Haruka stared at his grilled mackerel. It was the thirty-second time his father said that tonight.

"I just wanted to help the girl," he replied again.

"How can you be so careless?" said his father. "I had allowed you to join that swim club with Makoto, was that not enough for you? Should I tell Makoto's parents you won't be joining him in practices anymore, Haruka? Swimming in the sea in broad daylight!"

"Makoto and I were about to go home when he saw Hitomi in the sea. He rushed to help her. Was it wrong to help her, Father? Should Makoto have let Hitomi drown?" Haruka tried to keep his voice composed. Why was his father so angry at them for trying to help other people? Wasn't that the right thing to do?

"Haru," his mother said softly. "Hush now, dear, and please eat properly. You're spoiling your mackerel." His mother sat across Haruka from the dining table (his father had refused to eat), her blue eyes warm and understanding. In a quieter voice, she said, "Don't worry, your father is just tired from work."

Tired from work. His father was always working and tired and cold.

"Do not talk to me in that tone, Haruka. You could have died."

"It was the girl who could have died if we didn't help her."

At this, his father bristled. "You didn't need to jump into the sea! You could have called the fishermen—adults, Haruka, _adults_ —for help. You did not need to save her by yourselves."

"Well," Haruka said, putting down his chopsticks, "if some adults were responsible, then we wouldn't have to be on our own."

Neri had a feeling that her son was not talking about the fishermen anymore.

"Dad, please calm down. Haru is an excellent swimmer," she began, only to be cut off by Hisoka's sudden howling. Haruka, surprised, stood up with his mother and ran toward his father, who had fallen limply on the living room floor.

"You could have died," his father wept. They helped him back up and Neri went to the kitchen to prepare a pot of strong tea.

Haruka didn't know what to do.

"Father," he tried. "I'm sorry." There was no response.

"I was planning to leave with Makoto after I got the lost necklace from the water. But people _—_ "

His father pounced on him, yelping like a wounded animal.

Haruka liked it earlier that his father was angry, for at least the man showed that he felt  _something_ toward him. But now, he was beginning to feel scared. His father had a wild look in his eyes and was shaking him roughly by his shoulders. "Did you wear the necklace, Haruka?" he asked in a bare whisper, as if he feared somebody else would hear him.

"Why would I wear a girl's necklace?"

"I am asking you properly and you answer my question with a question?" his father shook him harder, and Haruka had to close his eyes in pain from his father's tight grasp.

"Stop, Father… I didn't wear the necklace. I just held it in my hand."

His father looked at him, hesitated, and just said "Very well. Go finish your dinner now."

"I'm not hungry anymore," Haruka said. He turned his head to his mother, who stood in the kitchen doorway with a teapot in hand, before running upstairs and locking himself in his room.

He spent the night and all of his Sunday just sketching, refusing to open his door to the concerned voice of his mother, and ignoring the delicious scent of mackerel she had repeatedly brought upstairs for his meals.

 

 

 

 

On Monday, Haruka's father bribed Haruka and Makoto with tuna and chocolate so the boys, who preferred walking now, would ride their bicycles to school. "To get away faster from the stares in the streets," he had said. Haruka was suddenly asked plenty of questions in school, none of them academic in nature, and Trini called him "The Boy Who Dived" thrice in the hallway. Haruka just stayed silent. Makoto asked around the school about Hitomi, but nobody seemed to know her, and he was baffled when the class lists had nobody named "Hitomi" in them. Nagisa, a bubbly fifth grader who was their teammate and who greatly admired Haruka's swimming, tried to cheer them up with a special penguin dance.

On Tuesday, Iwao started the rumor that Haruka was growing his hair long to hide his gills. The boys still rode their bikes to school. Haruka's father went home later than usual. Makoto overheard fishermen in the port arguing whether Haruka was or was not indeed a merperson's son. They decided Haruka's father was a merman, because Hisoka seemed "fishy". Haruka huffed at this and told Makoto to stop listening to tall tales.

On Wednesday, the boys were stopped by Sasaki-san. Makoto was scared, but the woman just gave them a basket of peaches, and asked Haruka how he was able to stay underwater for three hours. (Haruka's reply: "I take a very deep breath before diving.") A high school student punctured the wheels of Makoto and Haruka's bikes. Several people were whispering "freaks" and "Look, The Boy Who Dived and his friend!" as they walked by. Two of Haruka's teachers that day actually checked his neck for gills. Haruka decided he hated Iwao. Haruka's father came home late again, saying he went on an urgent business with Makoto's father.

On Thursday, Haruka went to buy ice cream with Makoto. He noticed two young girls bowing respectfully to him outside the supermarket. Makoto said he didn't see anything. That night, Hisoka thumped his son in the back good-naturedly when he saw Haruka's sketches of his father ("My, you draw well, son. That's a scary-looking kappa.") He seemed happy, saying business with Makoto's father went well. Neri looked upset.

On Friday, invitations were received by select families in Iwatobi. One was received by the Tachibanas, and one found its way to the Nanases' mailbox. Makoto said he quit the swim club as well, and Haruka didn't speak to him until lunchtime. Nagisa was unusually quiet, too. That day in school, nobody looked at Makoto and Haruka weirdly. Makoto said "Maybe, they forgot what happened last Saturday!" and Haruka responded to him with a very fierce glare. After reading what the invitation contained, Hisoka got angry again ("Why would we go to that new community pool? We have an inflatable pool, three bathtubs, and many faucets!") and told his wife and son that he'd had enough of swimming.

 

 

 

 

"So, you're not going to the soft opening tomorrow, then?" Makoto asked the next day, sitting side-by-side with Haruka on the highest step of the shrine, petting a little white kitten he named Snowball. They had just finished homework in Makoto's house.

"No," Haruka replied. "Father won't let me."

Makoto had wanted to ask Haruka about the reason behind his decision to quit the swim club, but decided that, like the previous days, this was not probably the best time to do so. "Then I'm not going with Mom and Dad tomorrow as well," Makoto said. "We can just play computer games at home if you want."

"When will you stop doing the same things with me?"

"Never, I think." Makoto just laughed when Haruka glowered at him.

"You quit the swim club just because I did, and now you won't go to the new pool."

"Well, swimming's not the same without you."

Haruka averted his gaze and looked down, as if he suddenly found the cracks in the stone steps extremely interesting.

"And actually," Makoto continued, "the new pool seems pretty boring, you know. We've been to pools countless times."

"But I'd like to go and swim in _that_  pool," Haruka muttered.

"Have you told Uncle Hisoka of our decision yet?"

"No."

"If Uncle Hisoka knows you quit swimming, he might let you see the pool as a reward, or something."

"That's ironic," Haruka said, but he secretly agreed with Makoto.

"Well, then," Makoto said, reading Haruka's mind, "Good luck Haru-ch _—_ , I mean, Haru! Go tell Uncle."

And then the two boys parted for dinner.

 

 

 

 

"All right, you can go."

 _I can?_ Haruka thought, his heart leaping with joy. He casually announced at dinner that he quit the swim club. His mother looked at him in surprise, while his father peered from his book with an approving face. He was still thinking of a good explanation to why he should be allowed to go to the new pool when his father said he could.

"But your mother and I are going with you. And you will do no swimming," his father declared.

They all rose early the next day. It was a bright, cloudless Sunday, and the Nanases, together with nine more families, other guests, and a media crew, went to Harborsplash Iwatobi for its soft launch. Haruka was in a sour mood, but he still was overwhelmed by how beautiful the new place was. It was four times larger than the whole of Iwatobi Swim Club complex, with two types of shallower children's pools, a large indoor heated pool, two outdoor pools, a jacuzzi, and an artificial waterfall with brightly colored _koi_. It also had its own restaurant and lodge house.

The Tachibana siblings greeted Haruka happily as their parents conversed with Haruka's. "Let's go swimming, Haru-chan!" Ran said excitedly, twirling in her starfish print swimsuit.

"I'm not allowed to swim today, Ran. Sorry," Haruka replied. Makoto looked at him in concern and herded the twins away to his father.

"We'll play noodle jousting later, promise!" Haruka heard Makoto saying to his siblings.

"What happened, Haru?"

"Nothing."

The two boys observed swimmers in Harborsplash's sparkling indoor pool. Haruka's mother, whose long, wet hair looked like a gleaming black waterfall, had pulled in her very reluctant husband into the water. When she swam, people stopped talking or diverted their gazes from the buffet table to look at her, awed at her fluid and elegant form. Harborsplash's owner, Nakino remarked in amazement: "Wonderful. So her young dolphin got it all from her." Meanwhile, Haruka's father was shaking in the water, and kept mouthing "No swimming" at his son.

Haruka's self-control was wavering.

"Haven't you noticed, Haru?"

"What?"

"The people. They're not talking about it anymore."

"I don't know what you mean," Haruka said, but Makoto knew Haruka did.

"I'm not saying it's not good, but you know it's a little strange," Makoto said. "The town was thriving with tales of you as The Boy Who Dived until three days ago. But everyone seems to have forgotten the necklace incident now."

Haruka sighed. "Will you quit that? People  _don't_  forget. They're just not talking now because Father is here."  _Probably,_ he thought. His father was an esteemed hydrologist. Despite being reserved, people thought Hisoka was a brilliant engineer and respected him. _  
_

"I didn't mean just everyone here," Makoto argued. "I meant the whole town. Iwao was kind to you again, didn't you notice? Sasaki-san looked surprised when I returned the basket to her, saying she doesn't remember giving us fruit, and the boy who punctured our bikes gave me sweets yesterday. It's—it's weird."

"Your imagination is what's weird," Haruka said. Makoto had a skill for imagination. Unfortunately, he also had a tendency to be overly speculative, which gave him easy frights. This was why he only watched scary movies with Haruka, who thought girls coming out of wells seemed a foolish idea for scaring people.

"I came just to spite Father," he said, attempting to change the subject.

Makoto sighed. He wanted to swim with Haruka that day, but if he had to prevent his friend from leaping into the pool so Hisoka would not be mad, he would. "Don't, Haru," he advised.

"Yeah. I don't want to upset Mom anymore," Haruka said, staring at his parents. "Come," he said, standing up. "The twins are calling you."

 

 

 

 

Makoto, accompanied by his mother, took the twins to one of the children's pools to play. They chose the one farther from the indoor pool, a square one with turtle pictures on the tiles. Haruka sat quietly by the poolside with Makoto's mother, watching the four-year old twins exchange rides on Makoto's back.

"Aunt Neri must have thought she could change Uncle's mind and make you swim later, so don't worry, Haru," Makoto said encouragingly, while he wiggled a foam noodle at Ren.

"That tickles, onii-chan!" Ren cried, then he proceeded to do the same to his twin. Lots of playful shrieking and loud splashing ensued, with Makoto groaning loudest as the twins pinned him down.

"Yeah," Haruka said, looking away from Makoto, away from the water, away from sibling bonding he knew he'd never get to experience. "I'll go get drinks," he mumbled. A lump had seemed to form in his throat.

As he walked back toward the buffet table, he passed by the other kiddie pool area, the one closer to the indoor pool. He peeked inside, curious as to how it looked. He thought he'd go for a quick dip. He saw a smaller, circular pool with dolphin designs on the tiles. It was empty, except for a young couple and a small boy who looked around Ran and Ren's age. The boy managed to climb out of the pool by himself, jumping up and down the tiles happily.

To Haruka's horror, the boy slipped, falling down on his backside with a surprised look in his face. He didn't cry out, though, and didn't seem to be hurt. The little boy quickly stood up and jumped at every blue tile again. The couple did not notice him doing this all the while. Haruka saw the man trail his lips on the woman's neck.

 _Notice the child_ , he thought angrily.  _Notice the child or you will be sorry._

He walked inside the pool area, glaring at the couple, hoping he'd be seen and they'd stop kissing. To his surprise, green moss began growing out of nowhere, covering the circular pool's surface like a thick blanket. When the couple still remained unconcerned by this, Haruka felt disgusted.  _You're not looking after your responsibility and you are dirtying the water,_ he thought as he fixed them a much sterner stare. The man's lips left the woman's neck to say: "Is it just me, or is it getting hot in here?"

"It's probably just you in your polka dot speedo, honey," the woman teased, "because I'm feeling warmer—"

"NO, HOT!" The woman suddenly shouted, scrambling in the water. "The w-water's hot! Boiling! And—", she said, horrified, "G-GREEN! Ahhhh!"

With their skins turning red from the water's heat, the couple tried getting out of the pool, but Haruka noticed that every time they tried to come out, the water seemed to smack them back down. The couple exchanged terrified shouts with one another.

Haruka felt the water turn hot, although he refused to believe it  _boiled_ , and he wondered where the moss came from.

When he tore his eyes away from the water to hold out a hand to the little boy, the pool turned still. The woman, crying, frantically got out of the water. The man was in a daze.

"You're—YOU'RE A MONSTER!" The woman roared to Haruka, snatching away the little boy from him. "You're that water freak kid everyone's talking about, aren't you? Get away from my son!"

Haruka didn't notice that people were coming in.

"Haru," a trembling voice called. Haruka turned and saw Makoto nervously huddled among the other guests, who all were looking at him and the pool area in shock and fear.

Nakino looked like he was about to faint. "What have you done to my pool?"

 

 

 

 

Makoto and Haruka's fathers came running.

"We have to do it again, partner," Hisoka said gravely. Makoto's father nodded, and Haruka saw each of them whip out what looked like fancier versions of a drum stick. Makoto's father pointed his wand to the mossy pool, asked Haruka to step aside, and mumbled complicated, incomprehensible words. To everyone's surprise, the moss vanished, and water that swamped various parts of the pool area had gone as well. In one flick of the wand, the area looked as clean and new as it had been.

Nakino fainted, while one of the female guests called Deshi started screaming "WHAT IN THE NAME OF—"

But everyone ignored her, for Haruka's father raised his wand high up in the air and bellowed a curious word that sounded like  _Obliviate_. After a minute of stunned silence, everyone blinked at one another in confusion, muttering (mainly "Why did we go to this pool? The food's outside"), and leaving the kiddie pool area in jovial spirits. It was as if nothing strange happened.

The couple who Haruka just almost cooked alive kissed again, this time hugging the little boy between them.

"Happy anniversary, honey."

 

 

 

 

The ribbon-cutting ceremony had finished, the live band played ten sets, more food was served, all pools had been swum in, and then it was time to go home.

"Thank you very much for coming!" Nakino said as his fleshy hands grasped Hisoka's.

At six in the evening, there was an unbearable silence in the Tachibanas' house. Ran and Ren had finished arguing over who'd get to sit with Haruka in the couch. (Ran won.) Makoto, refusing to meet his father's eyes or Haruka's, gripped his foam noodle so hard until it broke to pieces. Their mothers busied themselves in the kitchen, preparing for dinner. Their fathers sat with them, wondering where to start.

"So, what you just did in Harborsplash—" Makoto began. He choked back a nervous laugh. "We don't understand."

"What we did there was magic," Hisoka said simply, "and you'll understand it soon enough."

Haruka frowned. His father never joked, he knew. And he  _himself_  made the water become hot, had he not? He made moss appear out of nowhere. And the day before he quit the swim club… Haruka brushed these things off his mind and tried to think of other reasons, something more logical and believable, to explain what just happened in the children's pool. He came up with none.

"B-but," Makoto said, looking down at his hands. "Why? How?"

"We're wizards," Makoto's father replied, so casually he could have just said that the sky was blue. "You are, too." 


	3. Haruka's Guardians

"I can't be a wizard," Haruka and Makoto said at the same time.

Makoto's eyes were on his own shorts peppered with broken pieces of foam. Haruka had always been unique and skilled. Even before he dived for the lost pearl necklace, Makoto knew his friend was special. As for himself... he sure was taller than most sixth graders, he thought, but a  _few inches_  didn't make someone all too great. He couldn't remember a single time he was able to do magic. How could he be a wizard, when even reading about cauldrons and pickled frogs and cobwebs scared him! His father must be wrong. A wizard or witch was brave and skilled, the fantasy books told, and Makoto felt he wasn't like that at all. "I can't be a wizard," he repeated sadly, an air of certainty in his tone. "I've never done anything magical, Dad."

Tachibana Minoru looked at Makoto, his brown eyes twinkling behind his glasses. "Remember that time when Ran fell down the stairs?"

"She didn't fall, Dad. I was there, I saw. She floated until she got safely to the bottom step."

"Yes, indeed, she did. You didn't know it, but you saved your sister."

Makoto finally looked up at everyone. " _I_  made Ran float?"

Hisoka spoke. "Like Haruka, you have done magic before, Makoto. Bits and pieces, all sudden or unconscious, but magic still."

"So, I-I'm a wizard as well, like Haru?" Makoto asked. His eyes shone.

His father chuckled. "Yes, you are."

Makoto beamed and looked at Haruka. "Haru, we can do magic!"

 

 

 

 

Haruka, sheltered in silence, often wondered about a lot of things. He pondered most about how it would feel like to be ordinary. All his life, he had been the strange one: he was too quiet to be around with, too talented with lines and colors, too obsessed with fish, too crazy and skilled around water. His parents weren't that  _normal_ either: his mother also became really excited around large bodies of water, and he had a genius engineer for a father who people either feared or respected, but never quite talked to. Even his best friend Makoto, he thought, seemed strange for always putting up with someone like him.

His late grandmother once taught him a saying:

_When you're ten, you're called a prodigy._

_When you're fifteen, you're a genius._

_When you're twenty, you're just an ordinary person._

How he was looking forward to being twenty. To being finally ordinary. But no, at age eleven, somebody just had to tell him he was a wizard.

All hopes of being ordinary had gone.

Haruka stared at the floor, which Makoto had littered with bits of foam noodle. If he indeed made the pool boil and hurt others because of magic, then it was strange, being a wizard. He decided he didn't care if his father, Makoto's father, or even Makoto did magic tricks, as long as he himself stopped.

He didn't want to be a wizard at all.

Haruka stood up and faced the two bespectacled grown-ups. "Why are you telling us this only now?"

He was met with only silence and anxious looks.

"I don't want to do magic, nor do I want to be a wizard," Haruka said. "Take it away, Father. Powers, or magic, or whatever nonsense you're calling it."

"Haruka--"

"I don't want any of it. I just--I just want to be an ordinary boy."

Plates Neri was carrying came crashing to the floor.

 

 

 

 

For days after being told he was able to do magic, Haruka groveled. He waged war with indifference and uneaten meals. Yet, his father remained resolute. Magical ability could not be taken away, his father made clear.

A week later, Hisoka brought home a large dog with sleek black fur and blue eyes. He took it to Haruka's room. "Name him, Haruka," he said. His son seemed too stunned to even frown or glare, but after a minute, Haruka asked, "Why, Father?"

Hisoka just nodded and pointed to the dog. Haruka, who was then eating toast and mackerel, offered some to it. The dog stopped its growling and happily took the food, licking Haruka's fingers and cheeks. "You like mackerel, too, huh?" Haruka said, ruffling its fur. "Sabainu."

"Very well. Sabainu's yours."

"Thank you." He hesitated, then asked again, "Why did you buy me a pet?"

"He's your guardian, meant to keep you safe." With this, he slid out of Haruka's room. His mother entered next, on the pretense of cleaning out his cabinet, and told him everything would be all right.

 _When you have the ability to wipe people's memories away in case something goes wrong,_ Haruka thought bitterly _, everything will definitely be all right._ His father, together with Makoto's father, had modified the memories of everyone involved in the pearl necklace and Harborsplash incidents.

"It won't be, Mom," he said. "Sooner or later, I will accidentally hurt my classmates and more people with this magic I can't control."

"Don't worry, Haru. You'll be studying in a new school, and your inu _—_ "

"I'll be transferring from Iwatobi Elementary?" Haruka asked, shocked. He wondered if Makoto would transfer, too, when they were just a few months away from graduation. "To where?"

There was a sudden yell. Hisoka slipped in the bathroom and broke his foot. As mother and son rushed to his aid, the conversation about schools was forgotten.

 

 

 

 

"Neri, what were you thinking?" Hisoka asked later that night, as his wife changed his bandages. His voice was tinged with grief and bore no anger at all. Haruka was already asleep in his room.

Neri wept. "Dad, I can't bear to see him this lonely and helpless anymore, let us tell him the truth, I'll find a way to _—_ "

"You know what would happen if Haru knew the truth," Hisoka said. "We will  _lose_  him. I will lose you. We have no choice." He was crying, too.

Neri's voice trembled. "You _—_ you've sent owls already?"

Hisoka nodded. "McGonagall's letter was succint but kind."

"Haru is still in shock," Neri said worriedly. "It's good he's not supposed to get his Hogwarts letter until his twelfth birthday. If news of Hogwarts came to him right now, it will be too much for him. You alone are becoming unbearable," she scolded Hisoka. She sighed. "I wish you were more open with your feelings to him, Dad. I know you want to watch  _Macky the Mackerel_  with him, too."

"I do," Hisoka said softly. He looked away. "Regarding letters, I plan to send the whole lot to Haru soon. British children usually receive their Hogwarts acceptance letter on their eleventh birthday, and Haru  _is_  eleven anyway, so _—_ "

Neri pulled the bandage too tightly and Hisoka grimaced. "What do you mean by 'soon'?" she demanded. "And  _you_  will send them all? I thought you only sent owls to ask for help guarding the house! Not this. That pact of yours said he'd get the letter and be in Hogwarts  _next year_."

"He'll be going to Hogwarts next year. I still am with you that he should first finish his primary education here in Japan. It's only the letters he's receiving."

"Why?"

"We're leaving soon, and I want him to understand."

Now Neri deliberately tugged at her husband's ointment-sodden bandages. "Hisoka, we cannot leave our son alone like this, the poor boy! The pact promised we need not leave him until he was twelve. Haru knows nothing!"

"That is precisely the reason why I requested McGonagall and Kurosawa to send their letters earlier to me. It's time Haru starts knowing the details."

"Knowing his past and future from an acceptance letter… I wish we were able to tell him the stories ourselves," Neri said, her eyes welling up again.

"I wish the same. But we had sworn not to tell, Neri, you know this. Reading the letters, at least, is a good start." Hisoka stared at his foot, but it was not the part of his body that anguished him so.  _His son, who he had treated indifferently for years..._

"We're leaving in three days," he said quietly. "You've seen the circular pool. You've seen the necklace. You have felt your power growing stronger each day after he recovered it from the sea. If we don't leave soon, they'd be able to find both of you faster. My strength may prove to be insufficient, especially now that I just summoned his inugami."

Neri looked at her husband, a hard expression upon her face. "I am  _not_  leaving Haruka. Try asking me again next year, when he's finally in safe hands in Britain. Or, forget about his graduation and send him there now. He's teaching there, isn't he? I'll send them an owl myself _—_ "

Hisoka met her eyes gravely. "Neri. You know we can't do that without drawing suspicions. Until we uncover the truth about the necklace, our presence will only keep endangering Haru. This is the only way."

Neri looked out of the window. Her hair flowed softly down her back and hid away her face from Hisoka. After a while, she turned back to him.

It was no use arguing, she knew. Hisoka was right.

"You've talked with Minoru and Natsuki?" she asked.

Hisoka nodded. "They've accepted. Minoru is like a brother to me, and his eldest boy treats Haru the same way. He will stay with them until September 1 of next year."

"Haru's presence in their home can put them in danger as well. Their family has done so much for us _—_ "

"Minoru and I have met with Kurosawa and Ministry officials. Our request for protection was accepted."

"I'll still get to see Haru?" Neri asked again. "It does not need to be every day _—_ even from afar I'd like to see _—_ "

"We will see him," her husband responded lovingly. "I will not let them take even that pleasure away from us."

"Then I'm going with you," she said determinedly.

A room away, Haruka tossed fitfully in his sleep. Sabainu the inugami howled sorrowfully and climbed to Haruka's bed, laying a paw against his master's forehead until Haruka calmed down.


	4. Seven Letters

It had been more than three months since his parents left for Tokyo.

Haruka gazed at the bathroom ceiling. It was the usual of nights; the bathtub, scrubbed clean and filled with water, and him in it, flat and unmoving, on a descent into calm and detachment. Eyes closed, pulse steady, he had bidden himself to not remember. The water felt warm and safe.

He didn't hear the footsteps, nor notice a flutter of wings outside the windows.

"Haru?"

Hisoka had told him he had to move to the capital because of work. Promotion, his father had said. A higher salary, a more secure future for their family. This news disturbed Haruka greatly, but when his mother insisted to accompany his father to the city, it was too much. After they left, he did something he had not in a long time. He cried.

"Haru, I'm coming in now, okay? I have something important to tell you."

He would let the water take him away and forget _._  Underwater, he didn't have to think of his parents. How they were doing, the occasional calls, his mother's grilled mackerel that was his most favorite in the world, their faith in him. They trusted him, he believed, or else they would not bear being away. At least it was what he was always telling himself. Being angry would accomplish nothing, and he was very tired.

"Ow, sorry for stepping on your tail, Sabainu! Wait, is _—_ is that an owl again? Haru! There's an owl! It got letters, too!"

The bathroom door slid open, and Makoto's head poked in.

"Have you been in the bathtub again since lunch?" Makoto asked, extending out a hand to which Haruka grabbed on to.

"Yes."

This had become a routine for the two boys since Haruka's parents left. As Mr. Nanase asked the Tachibanas to be Haruka's guardians, Haruka usually ate and slept at Makoto's house. Makoto's parents allowed Haruka to go back to his own house, however, knowing he wanted to be left alone to soak and think. When it was time for meals, Makoto would fetch him. Haruka, who wore his black-and-purple jammers to the bathtub, wasn't sure how to feel with Makoto pulling him out the water. Water was a respite, but Makoto and the Tachibanas were his home.

He would find himself always taking Makoto's hand.

"I forgot Sabainu sleeps by the bathroom door when you're inside. Anyway, dinner's ready so let's go home. Mom prepared a lot, saying I'm not eleven every day, and you have an owl waiting outside the window."

It was November 17, Makoto's eleventh birthday. Haruka remembered too well. Especially since the twins had competed who could sing "Happy birthday" louder, earlier that morning. But, owls?

Haruka walked to his bedroom, toweling his hair dry. Sure enough, a large scops owl was waiting impatiently by his windowsill, tapping against the glass. It had thick letters in its beak, and some were rolled and tied to its legs. Haruka opened the window, retrieved the letters, and Makoto bade a cheerful farewell to the owl.

"What are these about?"

"Acceptance letter to our new school next year! A school of magic, Haru! I received mine a while ago, as well. But," Makoto said, looking at the stack, "I only got one. You don't suppose the other letters are from your parents?"

Haruka opened the one on top first, a yellowish envelope, and said "Why would they send letters when they can just call me?" In the envelope, addressed to  _Mr. Nanase H., The Largest Bathtub, 18 Halfway-Up-Misagozaki Shrine, Town of Iwatobi, Tottori, Japan,_ was a letter written in green ink both in English and Japanese:

 

 

_**HOGWARTS SCHOOL OF WITCHCRAFT AND WIZARDRY** _

_**Headmistress: MINERVA MCGONAGALL** _

_**Dear Mr. Nanase, We are pleased to inform you that your request to study for the next academic year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry has been accepted. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment. Term begins on September 1. We look forward to seeing you next year.** _

_**Yours sincerely,** _

_**Hermione Granger**_

_**Deputy Headmistress**_

__

 

Haruka stared at the letter in wonder and let Makoto read it as well. Makoto was surprised. "I _—_ my letter _—_ I received a letter from a school called  _Mahoutokoro,_ and the headmistress' name is different…"

"'Must be one of Father's many options for me," Haruka said. He picked up another envelope, this time a pinkish one with his name addressed in Japanese, beautifully embossed in silver.

"Oh," Makoto said excitedly, "that's the one from Mahoutokoro!"

Haruka noticed the Mahoutokoro acceptance letter was dated June 30, his birthday. He wondered why he received it only now. He opened it and read:

 

 

_**MAHOUTOKORO WIZARDING SCHOOL OF JAPAN** _

_**Headmistress: KUROSAWA** _ _**AMATERASU** _

_**Dear Mr. Nanase, Congratulations on your admission to Mahoutokoro! Please review enclosed materials, including information on housing, subjects, and the list of requirements. Term begins April 5 of next year. We look forward to seeing you.** _

_**Yours sincerely,** _

_**UDEA**_ _**SHINJU  
** _

_**Directress of Admissions**_

__

 

Makoto hugged Haruka in glee. "That's great! We'll still be studying together, then!"

Haruka said "Yes, we will" with a straight face. Deep inside, he was delighted, too.

But there was another pink-and-silver envelope waiting to be opened.

 _Two Mahoutokoro letters?_ Haruka had a bad feeling about this.

 

 

_**MAHOUTOKORO WIZARDING SCHOOL OF JAPAN** _

_**Headmistress: KUROSAWA** _ _**AMATERASU** _

_**Your request for deferral to the Intermediate Magical Training program at Mahoutokoro has been approved. Any queries should be directed to the Admissions Office. Best wishes to you.** _

_**Yours sincerely,** _

_**UDEA** _ _**SHINJU** _

_**Directress of Admissions**_

__

 

Seeing how nonplussed Haruka looked, Makoto knew immediately that Haruka had no say in this. "You didn't write to them, did you, Haru?"

"No," Haruka said. "I didn't know this school, or the other one, until now."  _But I have a fairly clear idea who wrote to them._

He opened the last envelope, which was plain white and unaddressed. He recognized his father's neat handwriting as he read:

 

 

_**Haruka,** _

_**Hogwarts is the best school for you to go to. I have made all the necessary arrangements. Minoru will accompany you when you buy your school equipment and leave for the Hogwarts Express.** _

_**The time will come when you'll understand fully. Just remember that your mother and I love you.** _

_**P.S.** _

_**I'm not sure Hogwarts has a pool.**_

 

__

"You'll be studying in Hogwarts, then?"

"Yes," Haruka replied grimly. "Thanks to my father."

 

 

 

 

Makoto's birthday dinner was a great one. Usually he had a chocolate cake for his birthdays sitting atop the table, but now that his father openly practiced magic again, the cake was dancing with the lemonade pitcher. For presents, his parents gave him a new bag, a new pair of shoes, and a LEGO heliplane set. Mr. Tachibana also handed down to Makoto his copy of  _A History of Asian Magic_ , a Tachibana family book. Haruka gave him a pack of chocolates and a sketch he made of Makoto with his family. After eating, the family and Haruka visited the shrine to give thanks.

Makoto requested a talk with his parents before going to sleep. Haruka watched a replay of  _Macky the Mackerel_  with the twins, wondering why Makoto seemed subdued on his birthday.

Then the lights were turned off.

Haruka and Makoto shared Makoto's room. Makoto never had a problem with this until his eleventh birthday night. He lay tensely in bed, knowing that his plan would fail if Haruka caught him.

He was certain Haruka would not disobey his parents' wishes as to where to train magically. He knew Haruka was tired, so tired of being lonely and isolated. He noticed that ever since the Nanases left, his best friend trudged through life, following Neri and Hisoka's wishes without a word, as if one day waiting for a plan of Hisoka to blow, so he would prove that his parents weren't always right. Haruka had become  _more_  silent and withdrawn, if that was possible, and lived aimlessly each day, caring less and less about schoolwork and preferring instead to immerse himself in the bathtub for hours. That, or he'd sneak into Harborsplash and lounge by the pools.

Determined, Makoto waited out the night, listening to Haruka's breathing. When he was certain Haruka was asleep already, he crept out of bed and began writing a letter. His hands were sweating and his thoughts were a mess.  _I should have paid more attention to English class_ , he thought, looking behind his back every minute to make sure Haruka was not awake.

An owl hooted outside.

He wrote:

 

 

_**Dear Headmistress McGonagall,** _

_**Good day to you, Ms. McGonagall. My name is** _ _**Makoto**_ _ **. I am eleven years old and in sixth grade. I live in Japan. I am writing to you to ask if I can study at Hogwarts. I only received a letter from a school called Mahoutokoro (it is here in Japan), but no letter from your school. I already talked with my parents and they are okay with my decision.** _

_**I asked Dad where Hogwarts is, and he said nobody really knows for sure, except that it's in Scotland. It's okay if it's far from Japan, I will still want to study there. I hope you'll grant my request. Mahoutokoro seems nice but my best friend will study there in Hogwarts next year and I don't want him to go alone. Also, do you have a swimming pool there? (Asking not for me, but for my best friend.)** _

_**I only found out recently I was a wizard, too. So far, I had made my sister float and conjured a light when I got scared of the dark. But it was all accidental. I am not very skilled, I think, and I'm scared of drawings of witches, but I promise I will work very hard. I will study and learn my best if you take me in.** _

_**Please consider me for your school. Thank you very much.** _

_**Yours sincerely,** _

_**Tachibana** _ _**Makoto  
** _

 

__

Two weeks later, at breakfast, a snowy owl brought back a reply. Makoto's heart banged painfully in his chest as he opened the yellow envelope bearing a large H in its wax seal:

 

 

_**HOGWARTS SCHOOL OF WITCHCRAFT AND WIZARDRY** _

_**Headmistress: MINERVA MCGONAGALL** _

_**Dear Mr. Tachibana, We are pleased to inform you that your request to study for the next academic year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry has been acce**_ — ** _  
_**

 

 

Makoto cried happily. "I'm going to Hogwarts, too!" His parents gave him a warm smile.

Haruka choked on his milk. "What do you mean?"

"Er, since you told me Uncle Hisoka wanted you to go to Hogwarts, I wrote to Hogwarts' headmistress if I could go there as well. I didn't want you to go alone."

 _You wrote to Hogwarts_? Why would you do that, Makoto?"

"You don't seem too happy—"

"Of course I'm not happy!" Haruka said, standing up. Makoto's parents blinked wonderingly at them. "Uncle Minoru just told me this morning where Hogwarts is! It's so far away, Makoto! You'd be leaving Ran and Ren, and Aunt Natsuki, and Japan… This is very _stupid_ of you, why would you do such a thing…"

"It's not stupid of me," Makoto said firmly, standing up as well. "I want to go. My parents and I have talked about this last night. Dad will be personally going to Mahoutokoro to defer my slot and Mom has—"

"BUT YOU'D BE LEAVING YOUR FAMILY BEHIND!" Haruka balled his fists in anger. His family had split up and he wouldn't let that happen to Makoto's.

"You're my family, too," Makoto said, earnest. "If you go alone, you'd be the one leaving us behind."

Haruka seethed. "You think I can't live by myself? I'll show you—"

"Also, somebody has to stop you from jumping into random bodies of water or you'll get arrested and detained. Imagine if you actually go to jail there for public indecency or trespassing."

Ran and Ren gave Haruka a grin.

"So," Makoto finished, "I'm going to Hogwarts, too."

"Why are you doing this, Makoto?"

Makoto smiled. "Well, you're my best friend. And as I've said, you're family. I'll always be by your side."


	5. The Dragon Scale Wand

A new year had come. After their elementary graduation, Makoto and Haruka did not enroll at any local middle school and their deferral to Mahoutokoro's invitation stood. While waiting for the thirtieth day of August, Mr. Tachibana kept them busy with reading magical books. (The boys groaned at this, hoping instead to spend their free days swimming in Harborsplash).

When Nagisa knew his friends would be studying in another country, he wept hard and promised he'd study in Hogwarts, too, to be with them. Makoto and Haruka looked at one another, both unable to say Hogwarts was actually a wizarding school. In a surprise visit, Nagisa caught the boys poring over battered copies of  _Magical Theory_ ,  _A History of Asian Magic_  and  _The Standard Book of Spells Grade 1_ , and seemed extremely interested.

"I can do magic, too," Nagisa said very seriously.

"What do you mean by 'too'?" Makoto laughed tensely as he stuffed  _Magical Theory_  under the couch. "Don't joke like that, Nagisa. We're  _not_  magical or something of the sort, are we, Haru?"

"We're not," echoed Haruka.  _We're not falling for another of your pranks, Nagisa._

"I know you are, Mako-chan. I can  _feel_  it. I know what Haru-chan did at Harborsplash last year was magic. It was so cool!"

"Not true," said Haruka. He looked out of the window. "You should go home."

"Oh, yeah, it's dark already! I'll see you again, Mako-chan and Haru-chan!"

On the morning of August 30, Nagisa visited the Tachibana household again, but his friends weren't at home. Together with Sabainu, Mr. Tachibana had taken Haruka and Makoto to a secret place to buy them their wands.

 

 

 

 

"Sayakins Wand Shop," Makoto read, looking up at the words written on a large signboard with a gleaming golden arrow. The wand shop was situated in one of Oki chain's 180 islands, together with an assortment of curious shops carved into its caves and cliffs. "Dad, is this where you bought your wand?"

"Yes," Mr. Tachibana replied. "Most Japanese students go to the Oki Islands for magical equipment they need for Mahoutokoro. But we'll buy only your wands here at Maaya's. The rest will be in Diagon Alley tomorrow."

"Good day," an old woman named Maaya greeted them. She had a round, wrinkled face and a cloud of purple hair. "My, Minoru, it's been a long time. Is this your son?" she asked, pointing to Makoto. "Tall like you, eh?" She smiled broadly at Makoto, who smiled back as he bowed, and also at Haruka, who only bowed stiffly in greeting.

The shop was spotlessly clean, with neat stacks of golden boxes lining up its long and narrow interior. "Come here first, dear boy," she beckoned to Makoto, and a tape measure began acting of its own accord, encircling him.

"Hmmm, I wonder, right... Cedar and dragon bone core. Thirteen and a quarter inches long. Durable. Well, why are you staring at it like that? It doesn't bite. Go on, hold it."

Makoto held the wand and waved it a bit, and it immediately emitted bright blue and green sparks.

"Well, that was quick," Maaya said, looking proudly at Makoto. "I was right about you being exactly like your father, who owns an eleven and a half cedar. Just don't be foolhardy with sacrifice, Makoto beanpole. In love, be not like your father, do you hear me?"

Minoru and Makoto's faces turned bright red. Minoru replied a very embarrassed "Please, Maaya, not in front of the children" while a perplexed Makoto asked, "What do you mean, ma'am—"

"Eh," Maaya waved a hand, "you'll know when you're older."

"Now, to this boy." Maaya lifted Haruka's chin with a gnarled hand and peered into his eyes. "Very blue, blue like the sea, and you emit a powerful, bewildering," she was saying, "but I don't recognize you at all. What's your name, dear?"

"Nanase Haruka."

"He's Hisoka's son, Maaya," Mr. Tachibana said.

Maaya's mouth gaped open. "Your best friend Hisoka? Somebody actually  _liked_  him and bore him a child?" She chortled. "No wonder this one seems so bad-tempered!"

Maaya now cupped Haruka's face with both hands. "Your father was a difficult child, sullen, oh yes _—_ clumsy, too, managed to topple a hundred of my boxes upon going here for his wand… but he proved to be an exceptional one, best in all his classes, I soon learned. A dragonhide cherry wand chose him." She opened a box.

"Try this one. Vine, ten inches, rigid. Dragon claw core."

Haruka reached for the wand, hands shaking _._

"Eh, no," Maaya said promptly as Haruka held the vine wand in his hand. She opened another box. "How about this, yes... Pine, eleven and a quarter inches long, dragonhide core. Straight-grained."

Haruka gave the wand a swish. It released a feeble gold spark and Maaya snatched it away from him.

"This seems a good choice, twelve inches, pliant," she said, handing him a cherry wand _—_ Haruka burned half of Maaya's hair. After about fifty wands, she picked a hazel one _—_ "Aha, this is ideal... a nice, sensitive wand, yes, for a quiet, sensitive boy" _—_ and Haruka actually managed to make water come out of its end. He couldn't control it though, and soon the whole shop was flooded, with water reaching up to Mr. Tachibana's waist.

"Don't worry," Maaya said, raising her own wand up the water _—_ the shop immediately dried up _—_ "we'll find you your wand, dear." She hobbled to the far end of the golden boxes, choosing carefully. She finally pulled a golden box from a bottom shelf, opened it, and eyes shining, handed it to Haruka.

"Ebony, twelve inches, dragon scale core. Limber and strong."

Haruka hesitated.  _What if I blow up the whole place this time?_

"Go on, it's all right."

Haruka felt a certain warmth in his fingers as his right hand gripped the black wand. He waved it around, feeling nervous and silly but pleasantly warm. It seemed to respond to his movements. It felt like the wand knew him _._ He raised it higher, and suddenly, a steady jet of water spouted from its end, encircling them all like a thin, elegant ribbon, spiraling upward in neat circles before being absorbed cleanly and swiftly by the wand again.

Maaya looked astounded. "This wand contains a white dragon scale, the only one ever given to my forebears by an unnamed sea dragon. For centuries, my family has studied wand lore and craft, I have made thousands of wands myself, and yet this wand remained in its shelf, its outstanding combative power not put to test. It has been in the hands of many students who came here, tried, examined... but that's why it's in your hands now. Never has it chosen anyone before." Maaya smiled. "Now, it has selected you. You must be one very special boy."

Sabainu barked in agreement.

 

 

 

 

After wand shopping, the Tachibanas and Haruka began packing for London. ("Hey, Haru-chan, of course we'd be going with you to Og-wars!," said Ren, while stuffing three more toy robots in his little backpack.)

Finally, at around 8 pm, it was time to leave.

Haruka's parents didn't even visit him to say goodbye, and Haruka was uncertain what to feel: he was sad, he was terrified, he was looking forward to a new life.

"Um, Dad," Makoto said, a hint of panic in his voice. He suddenly remembered something when they were all in the living room, trunks and luggage assembled. How were they actually going to go to London? "We don't have plane tickets, do we?"

Mr. Tachibana smiled. "We don't, but we have side-along apparition. Gather 'round. Now, Mom, Ran and Ren, and you two, hold on to me" _—_ Mr. Tachibana took a deep breath as Sabainu pressed his wet nose against his leg _—_ "and off we go!" There was a loud, thunder-like crack, and the Tachibanas and Haruka were gone.

Outside the Tachibanas' living room window, a pair of amber eyes glowed in the dark. "So the Nanases have friends," a woman whispered to herself, touching a white pearl that hung by her neck.


	6. Mayhem at the Menagerie

It was in the Magical Menagerie where they first met Rin.

"You can't turn that toad into a goldfish with just a stare, Haru."

"Sorry, Uncle," Haruka mumbled, gripping Sabainu's leash tightly. "I just wanted Makoto to have a pet again." He wasn't sure what was more annoying: being told he was magical and losing the chance to be finally free and ordinary, or being told he was a wizard, just to be  _forbidden_ to do any magic at all. They had apparated into London the night before, and Makoto's mouth wouldn't properly close from all the fantastical things they kept seeing: the Leaky Cauldron pub where they stayed, funnily dressed wizards, the bustling alleys between crooked and cramped establishments, and the overall magic filling the place Mr. Tachibana called  _Diagon Alley_. Still, in all this strangeness, Mr. Tachibana wouldn't let him use his wand.

"Haru's just keen to finally be able to do proper, controlled magic, Dad," Makoto said, studying Haruka intently. A screech distracted him, and soon his mouth gaped open again at the sight of the menagerie's assemblage of magical creatures. "Wow…"

Haruka glared at him.  _How does he know that by just looking at my face?_

"You'll be riding the train to Hogwarts tomorrow, Haru dear. Just a little more patience, all right?" Mrs. Tachibana ruffled Haruka's hair.

"Okay."

Mr. Tachibana looked amused. "Very well. We'll be leaving you here at the menagerie to go to Fortescue's. What ice cream flavor would you two like?"

"Chocolate," said Makoto.

"Mackerel," said Haruka.

"I don't think there's mack _—_ " Mr. Tachibana began, but Ran and Ren's loud shouts of "Ice cream! Ice cream! Ice cream!" as they dragged their father and mother out of the animal shop drowned out his voice. Makoto, Haruka, and a drooling Sabainu were left to themselves, wondering what pet to choose, thinking about water, and being fascinated by a pixie, respectively.

 

 

 

 

"Hmm, this white Persian cat looks just like Snowball! And we have the same eye color. What do you think, Haru? He seems nice, doesn't _—_ Haru?" Makoto looked around, but Haruka was not by his side. Instead, a magenta-haired boy with red eyes was looking at him. He was carrying a cage with a brown eagle owl inside, and under his other arm were various packages wrapped in brown paper.

"Hello," Makoto greeted, smiling. "Sorry, I thought you were my friend. He must have wandered off," he said, bowing a little.

"Cats are useless, aren't they?"

"Hah, what?" Makoto asked, astonished.

"Owls can catch mice, too, but cats can't send letters at all," the boy said, staring at a sleeping tabby cat. He then beamed at Makoto, raising the cage in his hand. The owl inside gave a little hoot, its dark orange eyes gleaming. "That's why I bought Vlad!" He smiled, his rather pointy teeth showing. "I saw him at Eeylops a while ago. Anyway, my name is Matsuoka Rin. I have a girlish name, but I'm a boy. How about you?" He said this very fast, bobbing up and down on his feet.

"Wow, you're Japanese, too! And you have a, um, girlish name as well." Makoto smiled. My name is Tachibana Makoto. Nice to meet you, Matsuoka-san!"

"Just call me Rin. You're here to buy a cat?"

"Well, yeah," Makoto said, a bit embarrassed. "We have already bought books and supplies with my parents this morning. I'd like to have a pet, though, so I asked Dad to drop us by here."

"Can I call you Makoto?"

Makoto nodded, smiling.

"Say, Makoto, my sister also wants me to buy her a cat, but I don't have enough money left. I still need to buy a wand." He gestured to his arm. "I just bought my supplies for Hogwarts. Are you going there, too?"

Makoto's mouth fell open again. "Yeah, me and my friend are going there as well! I'm really glad to know you from here. But first I need to find him. I wonder where he's gone." Makoto walked around the aisles, momentarily forgetting pets.

"Who is this friend?" Rin asked, following him.

"Haru. He's my best friend. He's a very talented swimmer back in Iwato—"

"Yeah? I used to be a swimmer, too, before finding out about all this," Rin said.

Makoto noted Rin looked somber when he said that. "All this?"

"Magic," Rin said. "Now I have a different dream. I'll be a Quidditch player like Dad!"

"What's Quidditch?" Makoto asked, starting to worry. They had gone around five aisles now, from various kinds of rats to poisonous snails, and they still hadn't come across Haruka or even Sabainu.

"Man, you  _don't_  know what Quidditch is? It's the coolest sport in the world! You get to ride a broomstick and fly—"

CRASH.

Makoto heard the collective cracked groaning of toads in Aisle 15, Sabainu's growling, and a thunder of cages and crates falling everywhere. He ran.

"What in Merlin's molars is happening?" Rin wondered, running toward the noise as well.

"Sabainu, no!" Makoto yelled, scrambling into the wooden boxes to catch hold of the dog's leash. Sabainu was too quick and large for him, however, and seemed too fixated on a flying pixie to notice him. "Where's Haru?"

The shop owner pointed her wand to Sabainu and a white light sparked from it, but this seemed to have no effect to the dog at all. Sabainu rampaged about the place, toppling over cages and shop customers as he went. She enchanted the pixie instead, and it froze in midair. With a swish of her wand, the pixie floated into an open chute, which she then slammed shut. "Stop, bad dog!" she said, running to Makoto and Sabainu. "My animals are getting away! Stop, I say!" She was waving her wand madly. " _Impedimenta! Impedimenta_!" Two cats by the door slowed down, and the shop owner picked them up with shaking hands.

Sabainu realized the pixie had gone, and calmed down.

"YOU!" The shop owner asked, looking at Makoto and Rin. "Do you own that dog?"

"I don't," Rin said.

"I—we… ahh—I," Makoto stammered. And then, he saw it. Haruka's  _clothes_ , lying in a heap on the floor, just by the end of Aisle 19. He ran again. "Oh, no. Oh, no, no… HARU, DON'T JUMP INTO THE FISH TANK!"

There was a splash, followed by Haruka's cry of pain, and a deafening sound of glass breaking into pieces.

The front door opened. "Haru-chan, onii-chan, we've got your ice cream!" singsonged Ran.

 

 

 

 

Makoto and Haruka's ice creams (both chocolate, as really there was no mackerel ice cream even in the wizarding world) lay melting on the floor, dropped by Mr. Tachibana in his shock. He apologized profusely to the menagerie's owner, saying they'd pay for damages.

Meanwhile, the owner's face was beet red in laughter. "Merlin's beard," she croaked, wiping tears from her face. She looked at Haruka, who was dripping in his black-and-purple jammers. "Just — why, boy? Why did you jump into an aquarium full of shrakes?"

"I didn't see the sign," Haruka said under his breath, red, itchy spots all over his skin. He glared at Makoto, daring him to openly voice his interpretation (which was the truth):  _Haruka did see the sign, he just wanted to get into the water._

Thankfully, Makoto just kept silent.

The boy sitting next to him, however, was talking too much.

"Saltwater aquarium of shrakes," Rin loudly read the sign. "Shrakes are magically-created species of saltwater fish covered in spines, deliberately created in the 1800s to ruin Muggle fishing nets. Ten sickles apiece." Then he looked at Haruka and said, laughing, "I wouldn't jump into a tank full of spiny fish even  _without_  signs."

 _I don't know you, so I have no opinion_ , Haruka thought.

"Why do you wear your swimsuit under your jeans?" Rin asked. "I'm Matsuoka Rin, by the way. I have a girlish name but"—Rin thumped his chest and grinned—"I'm a boy! What's your name?"

 _Too loud._  Haruka decided he didn't like the boy very much, whoever he was.

"Nanase Haruka," he replied.

 

 

 

 

Curiously, the menagerie's owner refused any payment. "Nothing was harmed that's not fixable by magic," she said as she waved her wand about and the broken crates and aquarium returned to their original states. "My shrakes seemed a bit squashed, my toads a bit traumatized, but I and my patrons had a great laugh, so thank you, mister…?"

"Nanase. My dog just wrecked your shop."

"Mister Nanase," the shop owner smiled. "It's fine. In truth, my shop and I have dealt with more damage than today's. I heard from Mr. Tachibana here that you grew up in the Muggle world so I understand. Just don't go diving into fish tanks again, you get me, boy?"

 _Depends whether the tank is empty or not_ , Haruka thought. "Yes." _  
_

After that, the Tachibanas, Haruka, Sabainu, and Rin left the menagerie. Makoto bought the white cat he wanted. Rin, meanwhile, bought a newborn ginger kitten which still had its eyes closed.

"It's cheaper," Rin said as they were walking down the alley. "Gou'll just have to find a way to feed it milk. I wonder what she'll name it, though. Probably a silly name like Tuftypoopy..." He looked at Makoto. "What will you name your cat, Makoto?"

"I think I'll call him Yukio," Makoto replied, smiling fondly at the cat. Yukio purred happily.

"That suits him well," Mrs. Tachibana said to her son.

Rin nodded in agreement. "He's white as snow. How about your dog, Nanase-san? What's his name again?"

Haruka pretended not to hear, looking down his own shoes as he walked.

"Hey, Nanase-san," Rin asked, poking Haruka's back with Vlad's cage. "I was asking the name of your pet?"

"Sabainu," Haruka grunted. "Stop with the '-san'."

"WHAT?" Rin dropped his parcels in surprise. Makoto helped him pick them up. "You named your pet Mackerel Dog?"

"Yes."

"That's…  _weird_."

Haruka spun around, a hard look on his face. "He's a dog that likes mackerel."

"Okay, relax! I get your pretty straightforward logic there. Sorry," Rin replied, though he sounded more amused than sorry. "An inu (dog) that loves saba (mackerel).  _Sabainu._  Yeah, really creative name, Nanase, well done…"

Makoto noticed Rin was trying his best not to laugh.

"Why are you following us?" Haruka asked.

"I'm not following you," Rin said, sounding a bit hurt. "I'm just on my way to Ollivanders for my wand."

"Instead of pestering other people's families, go annoy your own," Haruka said.

"I came here alone."

Haruka fell silent.  _This boy bought all his supplies to Hogwarts alone?_

"Are you staying here for the night, as well, Rin?" Makoto asked.

"Yeah, in a friend's house. Anyway, I guess this is where I say goodbye," Rin said, pointing to the sign of Ollivanders Wand Shop. He bowed respectfully to Mr. and Mrs. Tachibana and walked toward the shop. "See you, Makoto and Nanase."

"See you tomorrow, Rin!" Makoto said.

Haruka didn't say anything. He just wondered why Rin was on his own.

 

 

 

 

Later that night, in their room at the Leaky Cauldron, Haruka and Makoto lay on their beds. Yukio slept in Makoto's sheets, while Sabainu snored softly at the foot of Haruka's bed. It was past midnight, but sleep wouldn't come to the boys.

"Strange day today, isn't it, Haru?" Makoto asked, shifting on his side to look at Haruka. "I'm glad we made a friend today on our first day here in the UK."

 _Friend_ , Haruka thought, the word rolling in his brain.  _I'm not that stupid to not notice._  "He was mocking me."

"What? No, Haru, I'm sure Rin was just surprised, like the shop owner and the others. He was very friendly when I was in the cat section. And you know what, he said he was a swimmer, too, Haru, that's nice, isn't it—"

"You've made a new friend, then," Haruka replied, turning his back from Makoto and closing his eyes. He was tired, he told himself, from the day's endless wandering around Diagon Alley for quills and robes and cauldrons. He didn't get to soak in a tub or pool all day, nor eat any mackerel. And he thought the traitor shrakes in the menagerie would be friendly. Tomorrow, they'd need to be in King's Cross by 11 AM for the train to their new school. He didn't have the strength nor the time to talk about a random, dreadfully chatty boy they met in a shop. "Not me."

Little did Haruka know, Rin would be a very important person in his life.

 


	7. A Scar and a Song

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aguamenti is set 27 years after Voldemort's defeat at the Battle of Hogwarts. The boys begin their Hogwarts education on Lily Luna Potter's last year at the school. For Potions master, I tried Slughorn, I tried making up a bunch of other teachers—I got to at least five before I was convinced nobody can teach Haruka Potions and life lessons better than Snape himself. He'll be here. I'm very loyal to his story in the books but he just has to be here.

At five minutes to eleven, people bustled about Platform Nine and Three Quarters, parents and children's chatter mingling with animal sounds and trunks being dragged around. The Hogwarts Express stood red and glistening in the sunlight.

"Take care of each other," Mrs. Tachibana said, smoothing down Haruka and Makoto's shirts, "and study hard."

Ran was sobbing uncontrollably while Ren silently clung to Makoto's leg. Haruka was feeling anxious and sad as well, but he hoped he looked bored enough. Goodbyes were an uncomfortable thing to deal with.

Makoto hugged his siblings tightly. He buried himself in his father and mother's arms next, who looked both proud of him and misty-eyed. "I promise I will write everyday, Mom, Dad." Afterwards, Mr. and Mrs. Tachibana embraced Haruka. Haruka returned the hug as fiercely as he could, wanting to convey in silence all his gratitude to them.

"I hope the shrake tank was a lesson to you, Haru," Mr. Tachibana reminded as he heaved Haruka's trunk on to an empty compartment of the train. "Stay safe in Hogwarts" _—_ he tucked away Makoto's trunk next _—_ "don't do anything rash, and be careful around water." He clapped a hand on both boys' backs and ushered them in to the compartment. "Go on, hurry up, you don't want to miss your first train ride to school. Look after one another, boys."

The two boys clambered to the compartment, with Makoto leaning out the window for a last quick kiss from his mother and the twins. As the train moved, even Ren began to cry. "Ba-bye, onii-chan and Haru-chan!"

 

 

 

 

Fifteen silent minutes later (Haruka was staring out the window, stroking Sabainu's fur, while Makoto was reading a book), the door to their compartment slid open.

"Yo! There you are."

"Rin!" Makoto put down his copy of  _Magical Drafts and Potions_  and moved Yukio and Sabainu a bit so Rin could sit. "Hello! We were hoping to see you at the platform a while ago."

Rin plunked his trunk and Vlad's cage next to Makoto and sat down. In his other hand he held a pack of Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans. "I was also looking for you two. The other carriages were full." He grinned. Then he peered into Haruka's face and asked, "Are you sick, Nanase? Why do you have that funny look on your face?"

"I'm fine," Haruka replied. _No, I'm not. I'm sick of you. You're noisy._

"If you say so. Boy, I'm excited for Hogwarts! Oh, here, have some beans! Be careful with these, though. I got wood pulp flavor just a while ago, though now I have cheesecake. What House do you two want to get in, by the way?"

Makoto picked up a purple bean and cautiously bit into it. "This one tastes like normal grape. Are these really in  _every_  flavor?" he asked, amazed. "And do we get to choose our own house design and rooms there in Hogwarts?"

"No, by 'house' I mean house system that's usual to boarding schools here, not the literal one. From what I heard, a hat chooses for us"—Makoto and Haruka exchanged baffled glances at this—"and as for every flavor, yeah," Rin said. "Gou got a ghost chilli once and she cried for hours. Nanase, go on, pick one!"

"No."

"Er, Rin, Haru doesn't like these kinds of food," Makoto said.

"Well, it wouldn't hurt to try once." Rin picked a silvery bean and gave it to Haruka. "Eat this, Nanase. Come on, as a sign of our friendship!"

"Are you deaf?" Haruka hissed. "I said no."

"Fine, I'm going to eat it, then — blurggh, mackerel!"

Haruka tensed in his seat. "D-did you say mackerel?"

"Yeah," Rin replied. "Funny taste. I don't like fish much."

"I guess it wouldn't hurt to try," Haruka said. He picked a brownish-orange bean, hoping it's salmon or tuna. He got a shoe polish-flavored one, unfortunately.

"You know, I don't really care where I get Sorted," Rin was saying, as Haruka choked and coughed up the bean he ate and Makoto scrambled in his rucksack for water. "As long as I can play Quidditch. That's the important thing."

"It would be nice if all three of us get sorted in the same House," Makoto said, patting Haruka's back with a worried look on his face.

Rin shrugged. "Yeah, I guess. But since something else does the choosing, tough luck. Anyway, wanna practice English with me? You don't seem too bad at it, but you can do more." He smiled sincerely.

Makoto reddened. Back in Iwatobi, he and Haruka hated English class. But during their after-graduation break, they were studying the language together with the books Mr. Tachibana gave them. "It's fine, we're studying it, Dad bought us an English booky-talky. Thanks, Rin."

Haruka gritted his teeth.  _This Rin thinks he's so great and all._

"No, I'm cool with it. I know how hard it is at first, living here and not knowing the language, or people, or much of anything, really. Though it gets better. So, tell me more about yourselves. In the menagerie, I heard Nanase calling your father "uncle", Makoto. Are you cousins, too?"

Makoto smiled. "Haru and I just kind of grew up together. We live very near to each other and our parents are friends as well. We also have been classmates since kindergarten."

"I see," Rin nodded. "You said Nanase's a swimmer back in Japan."

Makoto nodded. "Yeah. I was, too."

"Was?"

"Um, yeah. We quit last year."

"Why?"

"Umm—" Makoto looked at Haruka.

"It's none of your business," Haruka said to Rin. He looked like he already recovered from the foul-tasting bean.

Rin just blinked and nudged Haruka with his leg. "Hey, Nanase, 'you any good?"

"I only swim freestyle," replied Haruka, sounding bored.

"Haru always won gold for frees—"

"Quit it, Makoto."

"My specialty is butterfly," Rin said smugly. "But I'm not bad at freestyle either. Let's race sometime, huh?" Then he sighed. "'Must be nice growing up with a close friend. I don't think I have any left."

"I wonder why," Haruka responded sarcastically.

But Rin took his reply as a genuine question and turned very serious as he said, "I had friends before. But we often had to move back and forth Japan and Britain because of Dad. He was training here for Quidditch, you see. Dad wanted to professionally play for the Toyohashi Tengu. 'Never happened, though."

"Why?" Makoto asked. Haruka kept silent, although his interest was piqued.

"He died when I was eight." Rin put his hands behind his head and looked at the blurry streaks of green fields outside the window. "Dad must've felt he couldn't just train and train, with me and Gou around. We became really broke here, because of rent and stuff, you know? So he stopped training and became a fisherman. I even helped him at times, that's when I discovered I was magical, too. The sea took him one night, during a storm."

Makoto and Haruka were very silent.

"I wanted to be an Olympic swimmer, but for Dad I'd win the Quidditch World Cup. That's why I'm here." Rin returned to his characteristic cheery self again and smiled brightly. "Don't tell this to anyone, is that clear? Or else I'll hex you." He laughed. "Anyway, forget that, okay? Wait, let me get something."

Makoto and Haruka stayed still in their seats, not knowing what to say to comfort Rin.

"All right, let's play!" Rin said, opening a battered Gobstones set.

With an unspoken, newfound trust and friendship between the three boys, the remainder of their journey to Hogwarts was spent with stinky marbles, more strange-tasting beans, Cauldron Cakes, ham and cheese sandwiches, and pumpkin juice. The obnoxiously loud laughs of Rin and Makoto as they played caused Haruka (who refused to participate, saying the squirting Gobstones was "silly"), Sabainu, Vlad, and Yukio to be very disgruntled, and all of them did not notice as the train finally slowed down, until a voice announced: "We will be reaching Hogwarts in five minutes' time. Please leave your luggage on the train, it will be taken to the school separately."

 

 

 

 

Now wearing their black school robes, Haruka, Makoto, and Rin, together with other first year students, followed the big and kindly Rubeus Hagrid down a narrow path. Swinging a lamp in his hand, Hagrid led them on until they reached the edge of a great lake shimmering softly in the moonlight. Makoto was clutching Haruka's robes tightly, wary of the dark and scared that Haru might jump into the lake when left unsupervised.

Rin raised an eyebrow. "Don't tell me you wore your jammers under your robes, Nanase?"

"I did. Call me Haru," Haruka said.

"Seriously? You're more mental than Uric the Oddball," snickered Rin. "Haru." He looked really happy to be finally calling Haruka his nickname.

"Please quiet down," Makoto said to Haruka and Rin. "Let's listen to the bearded man talking."

"Firs' years, jus' call me Hagrid," Hagrid beamed. "I'm yer keeper of keys and grounds. Now, you'll be crossing the lake ter get to Hogwarts. No more'n four to a boat!"

The three boys shared their boat with a shy, sandy-haired boy who wouldn't speak despite Rin's best efforts. The boats moved forward, Haruka  _almost_  jumped into the water nine times until Rin finally warned him he'd hex his jammers with bogeys, they reached the harbor, and then, after a few minutes of walking on the pebbly ground, they finally were in front of Hogwarts castle's enormous oak door.

 

 

 

 

"Thanks, Hagrid," a brown-eyed, smiling witch greeted them when the door opened. She was a dignified-looking woman in simple black-and-beige robes, her brown hair tied in a neat plait and her face a bit stern. "Good evening everyone, and welcome to Hogwarts. I am Hermione Granger, deputy headmistress and Transfiguration professor. Follow me, please."

"Oh, that's her! Mother said I should emulate her. Brilliant lady, that ma'am Granger, from school, to taking care of magical creatures, then law enforcement, and now Hogwarts' deputy head! She's accomplished so much, and she's only 47!" Makoto heard a girl whisper feverishly to her friend.

Hermione led Haruka and the others to an empty antechamber. "We have four Houses here in Hogwarts — Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin. Each House has its own distinct traits and triumphs. Each has its own dormitories and common rooms. The House where you get sorted to will be like your family during your stay here. At the end of the school year, the House Cup is awarded to whichever House garners the most points. Hence, every one of you is expected to contribute to your House's upkeep and standing. Remarkable deeds, marks you earn from your classes, and wins in Quidditch add to your House's points, while misdemeanors will make you lose points.

"For the Sorting, your names will be called in alphabetical order, and you will sit quietly as the Sorting Hat makes it decision. Again, please follow me."

As they walked, Rin elbowed Haruka and Makoto and breathed, "Professor Granger is beautiful but strict, don't you think?"

"Shut up, Rin," Haruka said. Then he fell into a stunned silence when he saw where Hermione led them _—_ a cavernous, magnificent hall that had an enchanted roof reflecting the night sky, with four long tables filled with hundreds of students. On a raised platform in front of the student tables was the staff table. Haruka saw, among others: a severe-looking woman in emerald robes whom he thought must be the headmistress; a balding, thin man talking to Hagrid; a man in all black, staring very sullenly at the students; a tiny wizard laughing with a slender, white-haired witch over some piece of parchment. Everywhere, they were surrounded by floating candles and a kind of magic Haruka never felt as quite as strong in Diagon Alley. The place was beautiful.

Hermione spoke again, telling them the names of the teachers. "You will get to know them more as your classes start."

Busily looking at a candle, Haruka didn't notice when Hermione placed a stool and a tattered, pointed wizard's hat in front of the teachers' table. But then the hat began to sing:

 

 

 

 

 

_**A second, a breath** _

_**A minute, a stretch** _

_**An hour, a distress** _

_**How long does it take for me to know you?** _

__

_**The answer to this, my friends fair and green** _

_**Is I'm a Cap that Thinks** _

_**But time is a Trap that Ticks and Tricks!** _

__

_**For long I have been trusted to speak only truth** _

_**To counsel with good grace young ones' best places** _

_**To free cloaked skills and wishes** _

_**And to understand the perils of youth** _

__

_**Because I am a Thinking Cap!** _

__

_**The lionhearted go to Gryffindor** _

_**But fears, oh, the lions have them, they do** _

_**Ravenclaw suits those whose imaginations soar** _

_**Or have minds that blaze like the fires of Floo** _

_**The canny learn best from Slytherin** _

_**That ambition and power can both be friend and rue** _

_**Hufflepuff chooses the kindest and most loyal** _

_**It reaps talents exceptional and unseen, too** _

__

_**And I, I am a Cap that does not Trick!** _

__

_**A second, a breath** _

_**A minute, a stretch** _

_**An hour, a distress** _

_**How long does it take for me to know you?** _

__

_**It matters not if I Think short or long** _

_**For I'm the Sorting Hat** _

_**A Cap that Thinks** _

_**A Cap that does not Trick** _

_**A Cap that is never wrong!** _

 

__

Makoto was one of those who clapped loudest when the hat finished its song and bowed. "A hat that sings! Wow, I read about that once in a book and now we actually get to hear one!" But as if suddenly realizing something, he stopped clapping and looked scared again.

Hermione began to read from a long roll of parchment.

"Amsel, Rosemary!"

"RAVENCLAW!" yelled the hat as Rosemary jammed it on her head.

"Borgin, Jillian!"

The Hat was only hovering by Jillian's head when it shouted "SLYTHERIN!"

"Brook, Robert!" The boy who shared Rin, Haruka, and Makoto's boat came stumbling forward, looking down his shoes as he put on the Hat.

"GRYFFINDOR!"

"Crumwell, Anthony!"

"RAVENCLAW!" Anthony came hurrying over to sit next to Rosemary at the Ravenclaw table.

"Foxear, Dugald", a burly, grim-looking boy, became the second Gryffindor, "Fuchsiafische, Cyperus" was the first Hufflepuff, ("Just what the heck is that name?" Rin whispered), "Gardener, Quintin" was a Slytherin, "Grousedale, Catherine" and "Gyeong, Hye Soo" were Hufflepuffs, and on and on Hermione's voice rang clearly in the hall, until _—_

"Matsuoka, Rin!"

Rin eagerly put the hat on his head. He squirmed when the hat began talking. "Ah, you have an unflinching will to accomplish your goals in life," the hat drawled, "a clever mind, too, very competitive, yes, I know… SLYTHERIN!"

Rin heard the hat shout only the last word to the crowd. He hopped off the stool, waved at Haruka and Makoto, and joined the Slytherin table.

"Murceo, Serafina!"

A girl with pixie-cut orange hair and light gray eyes calmly walked over to the stool, her head held high in a very snobbish way. The hat contemplated for two minutes before shouting "SLYTHERIN!"

And then, Hermione read, "Nanase, Haruka!"

"Good luck, Haru!" Makoto murmured. Haruka sat on the stool, expecting the hat to make a fast choice. He didn't want to linger in front of all the students' staring faces.

"Oh," the Sorting Hat said, and Haruka wondered if it always sounded this surprised upon being crammed on to people's heads. "Where to put you… What's that, anywhere? There is no house called 'Anywhere' here, boy"  _—_  the hat chuckled at its own joke  _—_ "Let's see, imaginative and original, yes, but very withdrawn… talented, certainly, modest to the point of uncaring about your accomplishments — very loyal to your friends even when you won't dare admit  _—_  highly perceptive, yet oftentimes you play out as insensitive and rude  _—_  you are a brave one, I can see it, you want to prove yourself  _—_  half of you is very impatient, I can't examine the other half… This is difficult..."

Haruka was becoming tired of the hat's ramblings and took a peek in the hall. He realized immediately the looks from the students' faces; they were just like the looks he got when he retrieved the pearl necklace and made moss grow out of a pool.  _What am I doing wrong again?_

Finally, the hat shouted, "HUFFLEPUFF!"

Haruka could see Rin's surprised face at the Slytherin table as he walked across the Hall and sat next to a Hufflepuff first year named Michael Hillthorne. The Hufflepuffs were cheering loudly.

"Hi, some trouble with the Sorting Hat?" Michael smiled at Haruka. He had long black hair tied in a messy ponytail and a brotherly look on his face. "Please call me Mike. What's your name?"

"Nanase Haruka," Haruka said dully. Mike, taken aback, excused himself and listened to a couple of Hufflepuff third years talking about hatstalls. After about five minutes, he turned to Haruka again.

The roll call continued. "Penblue, Marcia" was a Hufflepuff, "Rivers, Isolde" was a Slytherin, "Rollingberry, Richard" became a Ravenclaw, "Swansea, Pauline" was a Gryffindor, while "Swansea, Peter" was a Slytherin, and then _—_

"Tachibana, Makoto!"

Makoto trembled as he sat on the stool. Haruka was in Hufflepuff. Their new friend Rin was in Slytherin. Where would he be Sorted? He put the hat carefully on his head, closing his eyes. "Hello," the hat greeted. "Let's see... selfless to a fault  _—_  you get scared easily but I recognize courage, plenty of it in you, just waiting to be freed  _—_  you take your duties very seriously, not a bad mind as well, and extremely patient  _—_  I know where to put you _—_ "

 _Please,_ Makoto thought.  _Put me in Hufflepuff where Haru is._

"Eh, what's that?" The hat said. "No, boy, you are more suited to another House."

 _Hufflepuff,_  Makoto thought again.  _I want to be in Hufflepuff._

"I do not Trick, boy, but time does Tick, and people must be keen for some roast beef now," the hat said firmly. "You would do well in that House, I surmise, and your head insists you want to be with your friend, but I read in your heart a path more suitable for you. You will do well, do greater things in Gryffindor."

 _I'm not brave_ , Makoto insisted.  _I'm scared of the dark, I'm scared of the sea, I don't know what I'll do without Haru, I..._

"You stand up to me now, a choice you make valiantly on your own, and I admire students who choose for themselves. I heed them when heeding seems sensible. But in your case, you need to take my words to heart. Listen well  _—_  the bravest of men are often imperiled with fears, but that is why they are actually brave at all. Go on now, five students still remain to be sorted, and that boy in Slytherin looks about to faint from hunger. You belong in _—_

"GRYFFINDOR!"

Shaking, Makoto walked to the Gryffindor table, where students were hooting for him and applauding. He felt like crying, even as a bunch of first years cheerfully asked what his name was. He looked at Haruka who sat alone in a corner of the Hufflepuff table. 

_It's our first day here and I already broke my promise to you._

 

 

 

 

The Sorting finally ended and Professor McGonagall had begun giving out start-of-term notices, but Haruka was only pretending to listen. He knew Makoto was looking at him from the Gryffindor table but he didn't meet his eyes.

Makoto was a near Hatstall, according to Mike Hillthorne, as he took almost four minutes to be sorted. Haruka would bet a swimming pool he was arguing with the Sorting Hat to be put in Hufflepuff as well. Because what was it that Makoto said back in Iwatobi?  _I'll always be by your side._ His best friend came with him here all to way to Scotland to be with him. Now, they were separated.

 _He always breathes in my neck not to jump into water sources, and I always tend to hold him back from actually enjoying things,_ Haruka thought _._ In the meantime, he welcomed the change. He knew, however, that Makoto would definitely find a way to sit with him for meals and homework.

Rin was in another House as well. Haruka shot a glance at him. Rin was displaying his full set of shark teeth in the Slytherin table as he laughed about some joke an upperclassman shared.

The Sorting Hat called him loyal, imaginative, and perceptive… Haruka wondered about these traits. He never gave much thought about himself. He just always thought he was strange. Even now, in the wizarding world where he's supposed to be just like everyone else, he's still showing signs of being different. This frustrated him.

He was a Hatstall, Mike said, with the Sorting Hat spending seven minutes before finally choosing Hufflepuff. Mike also told him that Hogwarts had no record of any Hatstall for the past 52 years, and even for one, seven minutes was a little too long.

His thoughts were interrupted by a tall, thin man he recognized from the staff table. The man had balding, sandy-colored hair and rheumy gray eyes. Both of his ears seemed to have been cut or chewed off, leaving two dark holes on the sides of his head, partially covered with hair. A scar ran across his left eye, narrow and raised. "Good evening. You must be Haruka? I am John Brook, Defense of the Dark Arts professor. "

"Good evening, Professor."

"Meet me tomorrow in the staffroom at five in the afternoon. I will show you your parents' pasts." 

 


	8. The Earless Professor

"I'll be expecting you," Brook said with a polite smile, and off he went back to his seat at the staff table. Haruka sat stunned and wondering, too distracted by the strange professor's words to notice Yorkshire pudding, all kinds of roast meat, potatoes, cheese, sausages, shepherd's pie, blackberry crumble, toffees, and sponge cakes materializing in front of him when McGonagall signaled the start of the feast.

When Mike nudged him, Haruka only ate a tablespoon of mashed potatoes. He glanced at the table bitterly, the food not enticing him at all. _What a school. An earless professor acts all mysterious with me on my first day here, and there's so many types of meat, but no mackerel._

After the welcoming feast, McGonagall bade everyone a good night and students poured out of the Great Hall. Rin yelled "Breakfast's on Haru's!" to Makoto and Haruka before trotting off with his classmates to the Slytherin Dungeon. Makoto went to the Hufflepuff table to say a quiet "Good night" to Haruka and made way for the Gryffindor Tower. Sixth year Shelley Oakgrove directed the Hufflepuff first years to the Hufflepuff common room. Warm, round, and low-ceilinged, it was full of black-and-yellow, squashy pillows, cozy and overstuffed chairs, and quirky plants.

"Welcome to Hufflepuff House!" Shelley said brightly. "Now, I know you must be tired from today's journey to Hogwarts and many of you are still feeling a bit strange around the school, but don't worry, we will be here to help. Just one reminder for tonight, the entrance to our common room: tap the barrel two from the bottom, middle of the second row in the rhythm of 'Helga Hufflepuff', and the lid will swing open. Be careful with tapping, though, because anyone who gets the barrel or rhythm incorrect is doused in vinegar and barred access. Boys, your dormitory is on the left side. Girls, ours is on the right, so please follow me. That's all for tonight. I hope you all sleep comfortably, and good luck tomorrow!"

 

 

 

 

Three hours had passed since Shelley's energetic welcome, and Haruka knew he must sleep already. He lay awake on his four-poster, however, light-headed and worrying, a painful sensation nagging in his stomach. Sabainu was awake too, and was looking at him with soulful eyes. He got up, pulled two cans of mackerel from his trunk, and ate silently with his dog. His roommates were already snoring.

It took another two hours before he fell asleep, haunted in his dreams again by an old, white-haired man drowning him in the sea, while women with pearls for eyes exulted. There were also beaked creatures in a river, some strangling him with their webbed hands, another one crying, screaming at him to leave the water, begging him not to die.

 

 

 

 

The next morning, at breakfast, Haruka was about to take a bite of pickled kipper when Rin's voice rang through the Great Hall and he slammed himself into Haruka's back. "Table-hop!" Haruka nearly choked again.

"Good morning, Haru," Makoto greeted as he and Rin sidled into empty seats in front of Haruka, their plates filled with scrambled eggs, toast, and ham.

"'Morning. What are you two doing here?"

Rin grinned. "Didn't I say last night breakfast's on yours? We're table-hopping. Lunch's on Makoto's, and we'll eat dinner at the Slytherin table."

"Is that permitted?"

"I don't know," Rin laughed, "but the tables have enough space, I think, so that's not much of a problem. It's the people in them you gotta worry about. Let's compare class schedules! I want to see—" He looked up suddenly, startled.

A flurry of a hundred wings and screeches marked the arrival of mails. Rin's eagle owl, Vlad, brought him a lumpy package (it contained shoelaces and a hooded jacket from home), Makoto had chocolates and a letter from his parents, and Haruka, who was not expecting anything at all, received a letter from a gasping, wet owl that flopped feebly in a bowl of cornflakes.

Haruka opened the letter carefully. He didn't recognize the handwriting at all:

 

 

_**〆** _

_**Death awaits you in the earless man's hold.** _

__

 

He read the letter five times more, hoping for a mistake, a trick of the light, but the words stayed the same. _What in the world is this letter supposed to mean?_ _If this letter meant Professor Brook— I don't know anyone else with no ears— but no, that's absurd _—__ Hoping he didn't look as terrified as he felt, he quickly tucked the letter in one of his books and began eating his pickled kipper in silence. But it was all Makoto needed to ask, "Is everything okay, Haru?"

"Yeah," he replied. "Father sent a note, asking me how I'm doing here so far." Makoto looked like he didn't believe him at all, but didn't press on about the letter; he scanned his class schedule instead and said excitedly, "Our first class today's Transfiguration, Haru!"

"We're classmates?"

"Yes. It says double Transfiguration, Gryffindor and Hufflepuff, here."

"I see," Haruka said, getting his own schedule. He had four subjects for the day and two half-hour breaks until 5 PM. While he felt troubled, he was secretly relieved to be sharing Transfiguration with Makoto. At least he wouldn't be alone in his first class at Hogwarts.

"Aw, my first today is Defense Against the Dark Arts," said Rin. "I'd be sharing double Potions with you, Haru." He craned his neck and looked at the staff table. "I wonder who teaches what? I just know Professor Snape, he's Head of my House, and Professor Granger from last night."

Makoto, who was listening rapturously when Hermione introduced the teachers, smiled. "Professor Hagrid teaches Care of Magical Creatures. The little man on the leftmost side is the Charms master, Professor Flitwick. The tall one in a cardigan is the Herbology teacher, Professor Longbottom. Uhm, I think the one with short gray hair is Madam Hooch, our Flying instructor; the one next to her is Professor Amakata for one of the electives, Literature. The one in yellow robes is Professor Egreggy for Art and Music, and the tall, thin man in his right is our Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Professor Brook. We also have Professor Binns, but"—his lips trembled slightly—"one of my older roommates said he's a ghost. I've seen Nearly Headless Nick and the others last night, but I was surprised about having a ghost as a teacher."

"A ghost teacher?" said Rin. "Nifty! I hope he's funny, not like the Bloody Baron. That one depresses me. I'll be meeting you guys here in the Great Hall at lunch. I've to leave now."

As Haruka drained his twenty-first goblet of pumpkin juice for the day, he thought about Professor Brook once more. Fear surged through him.

They finished their breakfast and searched the castle for their Transfiguration classroom, getting lost twice.

 

 

 

 

Haruka and Makoto watched silently as Hermione paced the room. She had written very long, complicated notes on the blackboard detailing the basics of Transfiguration. In a clear, compelling voice she said, "Transfiguration is a branch of magic that alters appearance and form. It is precise, complex, and dangerous. Diligence and hard work, patience and organization, precision and control are needed. I expect these things from you in this class."

"Yes, Professor," chorused the class. Makoto neatly wrote "Inanimate to inanimate — matches to needles" in his notebook. By the end of their lesson, he was among four students able to change their match into a pointy needle. (Haruka accidentally pulverized his.) The class wildly applauded when Hermione transfigured a teapot into a guinea pig. She assigned everyone to read pages 8 to 41 of _A Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration_ for their next lesson and dismissed them.

Makoto was in a daze. "Professor Granger is a very good teacher. I was really nervous at first, not knowing how we'd do in our classes, but she's kind, and I got five points for Gryffindor... But I wasn't expecting my match to transfigure at all. Haru? Haru, are you okay?"

"Huh? Ah, yeah. Stop fussing over me."

At lunch, Makoto noticed Haruka seemed a bit pale.

 

 

 

 

Haruka's second subject for the day was Potions with the Slytherins. As he and Rin walked together to the dungeons, he could not help overhearing his fellow Hufflepuffs' murmurs.

" _They say Snape can be very nasty—"_

" _They say Snape is a brave man. He's now on good terms with Auror Potter, isn't he?"_

" _No matter. I stayed up until 4 am reading_ Magical Drafts and Potions _because I'm scared of him."_

Snape entered the room silently and began the roll call in a quiet, rigid voice.

For Haruka, Snape didn't quite look or act as nastily as the others were fearing. The man in flowing black robes had black, cold eyes, stringy, shoulder-length black hair interspersed with white, and a malicious tone in his voice as he began the day's lecture with "Potion-making is a subtle science and an exact art. I do not tolerate foolish wand-waving nor impertinent scamps in my class."

 _He's just like Father,_ he thought. _Distant and cold…_ He felt a sharp rap on his head and looked up. Snape was hovering over him menacingly. Some of the Slytherins sniggered.

"Nanase, is it not?" Snape said, snapping his register shut. "Five points from Hufflepuff. I told you to pair up with Matsuoka."

Haruka sullenly moved over to Rin's desk.

"Pull yourself together, Haru," Rin scolded in a low voice as they set up their cauldrons. They were to make a simple potion to cure boils. "Snape was calling you to stand up and you were just sitting there like you're having some fun fantasy."

"Shut it," Haruka replied. He began crushing snake fangs as Rin prepared horned slugs. Snape looked at their mixture when it was on its initial brew, and immediately left with a disgusted look on his face. Haruka looked around and saw Mike Hillthorne's robes on fire, and two Slytherin girls' cauldron shrinking and shrinking until it disappeared into thin air.

"Hey, Haru," said Rin as he added the slugs in. "What's your next class?"

He suddenly remembered, and fear came again. "Defense Against the Dark Arts."

"Ooh, that's an awesome one! Professor Brook taught us Curse of the Bogies this morning. I bet I'd learn it fully by the weekend!"

"'Happy for you," said Haruka, sounding not happy at all.

"C'mon, don't be such a deadhead." Rin leaned closer to Haruka. "Can I borrow one of your books?"

"Didn't you buy all your books at Flourish and Blotts?"

"Well, yes. But, uhm, my copy of _The Standard Book of Spells_ got, uh, wet. I left in my room to dry. I'd be having Charms later, so let me borrow yours." (In truth, his book was soused in nasal mucus, because he accidentally hit it while practicing the Bogies Curse.)

Haruka pulled out the book from his bag. "Return it to me at dinner." After an hour, they left the dungeons in low spirits, getting zero points for their potion—it had the consistency of mayonnaise and smelled strongly of cow urine.

It was not until Professor Brook entered the Defense of the Dark Arts classroom that Haruka realized the letter was missing from his bag.

 

 

 

 

"Good afternoon," Haruka heard Brook greet the class, a Hufflepuff block. His scar and lack of ears made him look eerie even as he smiled pleasantly at them all. Brook was carrying a rusting, four-feet tall human automaton and a giant pail. As he adjusted the automaton so it sat properly on the table, he said, "Today, we will be doing a practical lesson so keep your quills and parchment. We'll be practicing Curse of the Bogies. Bring out your wands."

Haruka got his wand from his bag, which seemed to fascinate Cathy Grousedale, his seatmate. "What a handsome wand," she said, smiling at Haruka. "Ebony?"

"Yeah," Haruka said, looking away from her.

The day's lesson involved raising their wands and pointing it to the automaton, saying _Mucus ad Nauseam_. Their hand must move in a precise, circular way, and the words must be uttered clearly. If successfully executed, snot would run from the automaton's nose and drip into the pail. Everyone took a practice turn, and soon, the pail was almost full of mucus, and the Hufflepuff first years were flushed from glee, thoroughly enjoying the class. Even Haruka felt stirred when he was given ten points for making the automaton release a "snot waterfall" during his turn.

His fears were now laced with confusion and curiosity. The earless professor did not seem remotely dark or unpleasant at all. He even tirelessly moved around the room, laughing with students, adjusting their arms and listening closely to their words so they'd be able to properly do the spell. Did the owl send the letter by mistake? There must be other earless people in the world...

Also, whatever it was about his parents, he needed to know.

He decided he'd go and meet Brook at five. _I'd deal_ _with Rin possibly reading the letter at dinner._ _If_ _I get away from the staffroom alive._

"Now you might want to ask," Brook said, as he waved his wand and the mucus vanished from the pail, "Why am I teaching you this spell on our first day of class? Well, here's your answer. You see, aside from giving your enemies a particularly runny nose"—the room erupted in laughter—"Curse of the Bogies can also come in handy when you don't like a certain class and would rather call in sick." He winked.

"You're giving me ideas, professor!" said Roig Yu, one of Haruka's roommates.

Brook laughed with the class. "I, of course, would advise against using that reason for my class, Roig," he said, smiling. "No, class, the real reason behind what I taught you today is this. This spell's arm movement is very similar to that of Expelliarmus. Can anyone please explain Expelliarmus to us?"

Cathy promptly raised her hand. "Expelliarmus is also known as the Disarming Spell, sir. Commonly used in duels, this defensive spell forces the attacked to release whatever they're holding, such as a wand. It is also used to block spells."

"Excellent answer, Miss Grousedale," beamed Brook. "Take ten points to Hufflepuff. Everything in this world, from the grandest house, the thickest book of knowledge, the greatest of wizards"—his look lingered on Haruka—"starts from the smallest. The _simplest_. It may be a stone, a word, or a basic spell, but as the pieces collect, things become stronger, wiser, and more powerful.

"The Curse of the Bogies is more a huge inconvenience than a real attack, but it is an effective method for self-defense, and can be helpful to you during your second year, when Expelliarmus is taught. Remember the arm movement." He looked at his watch. "Now, off you go. No homework for today."

The Hufflepuffs left with big smiles on their faces. Brook approached Haruka. "Do you still have class? I'm about to teach my last one for today."

"One more," Haruka said curtly. He grabbed his bag and made for the door, leaving Brook alone in the room with the automaton and the pail. He paused, then mumbled "I'll be at the staffroom, professor," before heading off to his Herbology class.

He didn't see Makoto and other Gryffindors entering the classroom for their turn with the Curse of the Bogies.

 

 

 

 

"But why would anybody hurt Haru? Why _would_ Professor Brook? There must be a mistake, he seemed a kind person..." Makoto's face was pale as milk. He found a very worried Rin waiting outside for him in the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom. DADA was his last class that day, and Rin's was Charms. Makoto was puzzled when Rin gave Brook a repulsed look; their class was very enjoyable and he found the professor funny and considerate.

Rin had pulled him into an abandoned room in the second floor and showed him the letter he found in Haruka's book. All joy Makoto felt from the snotty automaton was gone in an instant.

"All people seem kind to you, Makoto," Rin said, a hint of a grin in his distressed face. "But this is a matter of life and death for Haru. Look, Brook has no ears."

"So?" Makoto asked, bewildered.

"We need to find out how he lost his ears," Rin asserted. "Could be because of something dark."

"Rin, please be reasonable," said Makoto gently. "Why would Hogwarts hire teachers who'd hurt students? Professor Brook probably had an accident or two before. He's a great Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, isn't he? I heard one of our prefects say so, and besides, we've seen how he teaches today. He must have roamed the world and met strange creatures or conducted experiments that failed, that's why he looks the way he is now…"

"Oh, yeah? And what if he's not all too great like you're saying, Makoto? What if he strangles Haru in his sleep or something, huh?"

Makoto seemed to be on the verge of tears. "I don't know, but accusing someone of something like that is just— _wrong_ , especially when we only have a piece of paper as a proof… I—wait, what do you plan to do, Rin?"

Rin fell silent. "I-uh, I'm not sure, actually. If only I know a real curse now, _that_ maybe, possibly, but I can't even get Curse of the Bogies right—"

"Rin!" Makoto said firmly. "That's a wrong way to deal with this kind of problem! I think… I think we need to go to Professor McGonagall and ask for advice. And protection. They'd be able to keep Haru safe while they investigate Professor Bro—"

"Brilliant," Rin said, nodding vigorously. He grabbed Makoto and sprinted toward one of the staircases. But Makoto pulled his arm away. "S-stop, wait. Do you _know_ where Professor McGonagall's office is?

"Um, no."

Makoto leaned against a painting of a singing flower, lost in confusion and distress for Haruka's safety. "It's ten minutes past five," he said, trying to sound calm even though he felt really frightened. "I'd ask the prefects tonight for Professor McGonagall's office. Or some of our professors tomorrow. We need to find Haru first and tell him what we know. We just need to keep an eye on him till he's safe in his common room. Come on, he must be waiting in the Great Hall by now for us, I know he is." _Please, Haru. Be safe_.

Haruka was not in the Great Hall, however. He was sitting rigidly on a rickety stool inside the staffroom, a large stone basin placed before him. Brook looked immensely pleased.


	9. Lake, River, and Sea

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Makoto and Rin seek McGonagall’s help, and Haruka takes a first look into the Brook Pensieve.

Makoto and Rin lost all color in their faces as they looked around the Great Hall. "Haru's not here," Makoto whispered as he skimmed the length of the Slytherin table where they all agreed to meet for dinner. "Not in Hufflepuff either."

"No. It means Brook got him!"

The thought of Haruka being hurt was too much for Makoto to bear. He did not, and would not, believe that they had gone this far from Japan just to be put into peril. "Maybe he took a dip in the lake," he said, fighting to keep his voice in control.  _Haru did not even want to leave home, we just went here to learn magic, Uncle Hisoka said this is the best school…_

"Well, yeah, that can work, too. Haru and his weird habits with water — if we find him there, I'll clout him in the head for making us worry," Rin said with gritted teeth. "Let's go!"

The two boys broke into a run, ignoring a prefect's call of "It's almost dark, where are you two going?" until they reached the castle grounds and saw the lake, and they slammed into Hagrid's vast belly in their haste, seeing no sign of Haruka in the water.

"Haru!" Rin shouted. The lake lay still and silent.

"W-we're very sorry, Professor Hagrid," Makoto panted, clutching at his sides.

"'S nothing," Hagrid said, a twinkle in his beetle-black eyes. "Jus' call me Hagrid. Firs' years, eh? What's yer names?"

"I'm Makoto, Profe- I mean Hagrid, sir, and this is Rin."

"Be about ter go inside the castle for dinner. Why are yeh outside, lookin' fer someone?"

"Yeah, but I think he's gone back to the castle now," Rin lied, an idea in his head. "Please, Hagrid, do you know where Professor McGonagall's office is?

"Well, yes, o'course, 's in the seventh floor. Yeh gotta get past a large gargoyle in the halls, an' the password's  _Devon Rex_ —wait, why are yeh askin' me this?"

"Our friend Haru is very homesick and has been crying all day, wanting to get home," said Rin, sounding anxious in a very convincing way. (Makoto looked mortified at such a bad lie.) "We'd like to ask Professor McGonagall for advice. Thank you, Hagrid!"

Hagrid's expression softened as he gave Makoto and Rin a kind pat on the shoulders, and the boys nearly doubled over from the force of his large hand. "I miss me mum and dad, too. I 'spect Professor McGonagall's busy, but she will listen ter yeh, I know it. Now, get back ter the castle before dark, yeh hear me?"

"Yes, Hagrid. Thanks! Come, Makoto," Rin said. "I'm sure Professor McGonagall will be able to help us out with Haru's  _problem_. And oh, Hagrid, what do you think of Professor Brook?"

Hagrid chuckled. "Yeh think John's a bit strange, don't yeh? Bin here fer years, an' I gotta say, he's one of the best professors fer Defense Against the Dark Arts we've had, and not a bad man too fer magical creatures an' firewhisky. Good man, Brook."

Makoto and Rin looked at one another.

 

 

"If we were quick enough, McGonagall should still be in her office and not in the Hall," Rin said as they reached a large gargoyle in the seventh floor. He held the letter from Haruka's book tightly in his hand.

Makoto nodded. "Devon Rex!" The gargoyle sprang to life and moved aside as the wall behind it split in two. They stepped onto a spiral staircase that moved smoothly upward in circles, higher and higher, until they saw an oak door. Makoto knocked softly, the door opened, and they entered the headmistress' office quietly.

The room was circular and spacious. In it were a large, claw-footed teak desk and high chair, where McGonagall was currently sitting, a thick heap of letters and parchment surrounding her ink and quill. Except for the many portraits of old headmasters and headmistresses lining up the walls and the letters, the place was very tidy and unadorned.

"Good day, Professor McGonagall," Makoto began, "I, w-we apologize for disrup—"

"Good day, Mr. Tachibana, Mr. Matsuoka," McGonagall said, peering at them from her square-shaped glasses, her hair drawn in a tight bun. If she was surprised or cross at all to see two first years barging unexpectedly in her office, her stern face gave no indication. "What brings you here?" She conjured two chairs and beckoned the two. "Sit."

"We want to talk to you about uh, something." Makoto looked nervously at Rin. "About Professor Brook and our friend, Nanase Haruka. I think — we think, Professor Brook, he's nice and he's a very good professor, really he is, we enjoyed our class today with him, professor — but there's something that we discovered, and, um, while it does not point directly to him, and the letter is unaddressed, we think that—"

"We think Brook can't be trusted, and he may attack Haru anytime," said Rin, handing McGonagall the letter.  _There, I said it,_ he thought.  _Crickets, Makoto is kind and all, but he's such a wuss with these winded explanations, Haru could be dead before he even finished._

Makoto thought he saw a glint in McGonagall's eyes as she read the letter. "I'm afraid I will have to take this. I assure you it will be reviewed rigorously."

"Professor Brook—"

"Professor John Brook is a close confidant to the Nanases, as well as a greatly talented and trusted faculty of this school. He will never do harm to Nanase Haruka."

Makoto and Rin fidgeted in their seats, looking at McGonagall expectantly.

"Do you have any more concerns?"

"Is that it?" pressed Rin. " _Reviewed rigorously?_  That's all?"

"Please, professor," said Makoto. "What if something happens to Haru?"

McGonagall's lips looked thinner than usual as she gave Rin a look, but her eyes were warm and her voice became surprisingly gentle when she spoke to them. "I understand your concern for your friend. Nanase Haruka is in this school for a special reason. Rest assured, he is protected," she said calmly.

"But, professor—"

"As I said, Mr. Tachibana, Mr. Nanase's studying in Hogwarts— _Hogwarts,_  and not Mahoutokoro—for a reason. That is because Professor Brook is a teacher in this school. Now if you'd please. I have correspondence to attend to." Her eyes lingered on their windswept hair and unfastened, messy robes. "You may do well smartening yourselves up before dinner."

"I can't believe it," Rin said bitterly after they left McGonagall's office and climbed down the stairs. "What will she do exactly? Brook's friends with Haru's parents? Haru's here for a special reason, she says, but you'd think she'll actually explain herself, right? I mean, so at least we can help, too!"

But McGonagall's words and her action toward the letter had made Makoto think. He heard from their prefects that McGonagall, despite being strict and austere, is protective and fair to students, and very loyal to Hogwarts. Surely, the headmistress of such a famous and respected wizarding institution would not simply disregard the safety of its students, if she could indeed see the immediacy and realness of danger. Maybe they're missing out on something...

"Rin, the letter says  _Death awaits you in the earless man's hold,_ right?"

Rin just grunted, which Makoto took as an affirmative.

"I think we should give it another interpretation."

"Huh?"

"Death waits for Haru in Professor Brook's company. We thought it'd be  _Haru's_  death, right?"

Rin caught on. "What if it isn't?"

 

 

In the staffroom, Brook beckoned Haruka to come closer.

"This, Haruka," Brook said, "is a pensieve. There are others like it in our world, but only a handful, I believe we have one in the headmistress' office. This one has been in my family's possession for two centuries."

Haruka stood from his stool and walked toward the professor. His legs were threatening to give out from dread, and a voice in his mind urged him to return to the Great Hall, to leave this place and instead be in the company of his friends again, no matter how annoying they could be, especially Rin. Yet, another part of him was seeking to find answers, advising him to stay, telling him to trust this man, to ask questions, to _look_. He took a breath and peered closer.

The pensieve looked like a normal stone basin, shallow and circular, washed with blue, with strange silver symbols carved on its edges. There was something in it, silvery and bright, that he could not quite comprehend. It looked a bit like water. Only he knew it was not liquid—it was more like a cross between a cloud and wind, trapped and swirling smoothly. "What is it?" he asked.

"It is a  _memory_ , Haruka, the first among the ones your father have entrusted to me. One uses a pensieve to look down upon memories and remember or study them in detail. Through this, you may be able to see your parents' pasts." Brook smiled kindly, gesturing to the bottles lined up on his table, full of the same silvery stuff. "I knew you'd be just as quiet as Hisoka used to be, but I was thinking you'd at least ask who I was. I wonder, Haruka, how much do you know about me? Hisoka couldn't have told you."

 _I got a letter this morning, something about you and death._ "I've only known you from here, Professor."

Brook chuckled. "That was why I suggested to Hisoka that I show you a memory of mine first, to let you know how he and I met, but it was your father's order to start with the most important memories. I guess a little story should suffice." He walked over to the pensieve, putting one hand just over the rim. "I owe my life to your father, Haruka. He had saved me twice.

"A year after my Hogwarts education, I wanted to travel the world to further my studies on Dark creatures. Japan was, to say the least, a very fascinating place for me, and I would always spend hours on the library studying yōkai of Japanese folklore. With some background information from a Hufflepuff schoolmate and close friend of mine, I packed my bags and went to Shimane. I almost got drowned on my first day there, tailing three wild, full-grown kappas on a river, if not for your father and Minoru, who happened to be passing by. That encounter in the river started our lifelong friendship."

Haruka frowned. He could never picture his father helping people, unless something consequential could be gained.  _Maybe Uncle Minoru forced him to help Brook.  
_

"Oh," Brook said, "Hisoka prattled for hours how stupid I was after saving me, but you know, being the most brilliant wizard Japan has produced in recent years and having connections in your country, he helped me secure a residency at Mahotoukoro, and I was able to stay as a researcher, all expenses free, food and lodging. He was kind, your father, only he liked to hide that behind his thick glasses and scowls all the time."

 _His father, kind?_  Haruka thought that maybe his ears were damaged from too much pool water.

"The friendship your father, Minoru, and I had built from that kappa attack was unfortunately tested sooner than I would have liked. I was much too careless and inexperienced—we were barely out of our teens then—and did not heed their advice on tackling an oni. I was clubbed to near death, my nose and wand were broken, I almost lost an eye, my ears were meat and had to be cut off. Magic, I realized as your father calmed down the creature with simple wand work, was more spiritual in places, more flowing and devotional, yet just as complex. Your father was the most talented Diviner I have ever met, and I was witness to his love for you and your mother. I left Japan after four years with no ears and a broken face, but I had splendid, firsthand knowledge of Japanese magic, I escaped death twice, and I had great memories with friends."

Brook put a hand on Haruka's shoulder, voice dropping. "I need to stop now, as you need to see things for yourself. Go on, look into the pensieve. This first memory is Neri's."

Haruka nodded, but the onslaught of information was making his head pound painfully. Never before had his parents told him about magic, or their friends, or even much of their lives. And he's learning them all from this man, who claimed to have been saved from death by his father twice, which in itself did not seem believable enough. Haruka always thought his father had the compassion and friendliness of a grilling plate.

Still, he had to admit, a bigger part of himself—the one not shutting down Brook's words as rubbish—wanted to believe the professor. After all, he had nothing to lose if the man proved to be lying.  _Only my life_ , he thought numbly. He didn't understand a lot of things—why his parents sent him to Hogwarts, why they left, why his nightmares about water worsened when he and Makoto helped Hitomi, why someone sent him a letter that warned him of death. Maybe this basin would give him the answers he wanted without asking, and so he'd give it a try.

Besides, how much stranger could his life get? A year ago, he was simply a boy who greatly loved water. This memory thing being extracted from brains or something, it could not be more impossible than being a wizard, making pools boil, hats reading people's minds, or apparating into places, wasn't it?

Haruka's face touched the ethereal mist, and he felt like he was being lifted, siphoned into the depths of the pensieve. There was darkness, and he was spinning, and then there was a loud splash as he plunged deep into a sea, curiously not getting wet at all. He swam closer, lower, until his feet touched sand. Strange, human-like beings with translucent skin and sand, shells, and scales in their very long hair; limbs lithe and long, legs covered in crusted salt and lichen; and eyes as clear as colored glass, were clustered together over someone, a woman black-haired and blue-eyed.

His mother.

 

* * *

_Postscript on the blog (yokai, Pensieves)._


	10. The Brook Pensieve

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Haruka takes a look into the past. His mother’s memory changes everything he believed to be true about his life, his father, and his family. Rin and Makoto finally find where he is, and Rin pretends he does not care at all (he does).

Sunshine streaked through green-gray depths, illuminating the sea Haruka found himself in. He supposed he was somewhere very deep, but the light bounced against hundreds of pearl-and-coral turrets that rose against the sand and formed an immense tangle of dwellings, and he felt unsure. Was the warm, bright cast on everything just a play of the light? Was all this he was witnessing a trick of Brook in his mind? How was this world even within a  _basin?_  The vast sea floor was alive with the most fantastic plants and animals he had seen yet. There were those that looked simply bizarre, like giant fish with gnarly teeth, firefly squid, moving stones, golden vines that were singing such a mournful but lovely tune, and a boulder-like creature that was driving away passing animals with its wails and violent shaking. But there were also familiar ones: sea turtles, flame and snow corals, sandeels, starfish, and schools of colorful fish swimming leisurely past or flitting in and out of tall seagrasses, trailing bubbles in their midst. He felt fascinated and at home in this strange place. Somehow, it all seemed familiar. The frustrating sensation he always felt when he's not around water was gone, too. Here he felt calm.

Maybe it was the effect of the pensieve, he thought, that he was able to breathe and walk underwater. He could not touch the water, and his school robes were dry. Maybe it was just a memory of a dream his mother had shared to him once.  _Living under the sea._  When he was younger, they talked about it over miso and mackerel, laughing together. He would never forget how much his father became so angry at them for talking about, according to Hisoka, the impossible.

But the magical world had taught him a lot so far about the possibility of everything.

 

 

He approached his mother and the group of unearthly beings, passing by a group of surgeonfish but not breaking their formation at all, and the animals were seemingly unaware of his presence. "Mom," he called out softly, joy swelling inside him together with fear. He didn't care about the others. They looked human, but they had no real warmth in their glassy eyes, they had fin-like ears, plants and animals held on to their crystalline, bloodless skin, and they radiated varying levels of brightness, as if a very powerful energy source was within them. He had not seen his mother in months, and this may be the only time he could before his father took her away from him again. His questions would come later. She was all that mattered. "Mom, it's me—"

But his mother didn't even look his way. She was looking at the beings in front of her, ignoring Haruka completely.

"You, Nerissa the Black Wave, a former Salacian undine, will bring your son to the Order on his seventh day," one of the beings, Lamine, said to Nerissa. Lamine's hair was brown kelp braided ornately.

_Mom is a what?_

"My son, Haruka, is human, and this realm is not his place," Nerissa said, her eyes steely blue.

"The Ways state that we undines, water elementals and protectors of ocean and sea, of river and fen, of ice and steam, will only lose immortality and gain a soul once we rise to the surface, and live with a man and know life enough by bearing him one — a living, human child. The Ways never erred, we know this. An offspring of an undine and a human has always been a human. But your son, though born with flesh and bone like his father, has no soul even as you gained one. It is something that even the gods do not comprehend, a quandary that puts the Ways in precarious fate."

The light in Nerissa's eyes faded. "My son is  _human,_ " she repeated. "It's not been a week that I have given birth to him, his soul, surely, will manifest itself soon enou—"

"Nonsense. You very well know that humans are always born with a soul in them. He will be given to the Order, by command of the Sea King. You will bring him here on his seventh day, and leave for the surface with your mortal husband, never to return."

"I will not bring him here to just die!"

"Nerissa, surely you must understand. You and the mortal have disrupted life's cycle by producing a child with such an  _affliction_. You have blurred the realms of both man and elemental by giving life to your child, who has no soul and no elemental powers. While the Ways state that all is one and one is all, a being cannot be both undine and human, nor can they exist and be nothing. You know this. You have known this for lifetimes, from when you guarded the night waters and those that crossed it. You have known this before you gave yourself to that human, and willingly lost your immortality and power as a Salacian undine. He has to be sacrificed. We can't take him even if we wanted to; we are forbidden, and our duty to nature comes first."

"T-the gods, I'll ask them to give my son a soul."

"This goes against the Ways! You cannot simply do such a thing! If people can have souls and life from the gods at their behest, then life itself will not be valued as it is valued by them. Do you not understand? You will ruin the balance of the world!" said Lamine.

"Have me die in his place, then. I'll give up my humanity. Let him have my soul and live, leave him and my husband be," Nerissa said calmly.

Lamine laughed, and yet her eyes were full of pity. "You will sacrifice your soul for an empty human shell? You have been human for less than a year, and yet you're as foolish now as most of them are. Death is the only way for your child, to bring back balance to the Ways, and you know this. You can always create another life—"

"Life is not simply created, Lamine", said Nerissa drily, "nor is it simply taken away. Still, I will abide by the Ways, as you say I must. I will take my son here on his seventh day."

 

 

_NO._

"Mom!" Haruka yelled, pushing past two of the undines, feeling scared and confused and desperate. Realizing the beings didn't even flinch as he barged through them, and seeing the looks they gave his mother — disdained, worrying, shocked — all focused only on her, it dawned on him. They couldn't see or hear him at all. This was really just a memory, something he was allowed to see, but could not be part of in a way he wanted to. Still, it was real.  _Something about me having no soul and Mom, an undine…_ A sharp burst of laughter caught in his throat, and the pain in his head racked throughout his body.

He watched as his mother raised herself to the water's surface in a wave of her hand, and he attempted to do the same. No use. He tried swimming, but the sea was fading into darkness… He couldn't carve an opening, and he couldn't actually feel the water, everything was swirling very fast... And then suddenly he was at the porch of their house in Iwatobi, walking behind Nerissa. The front door opened, and there was Hisoka, smiling warmly at his wife, carrying a three-day old, black-haired baby in his arms.

 

 

They both looked so different, Haruka thought, hurrying inside the house after his mother. His father and him. It felt strange seeing his tiny self. He was so quiet even as a baby, he thought, a bit amused, before realizing why: he didn't have a soul inside him like what the kelp lady Lamine said. Hisoka had his perpetual look of worry on his face, but he looked more youthful: his hair was not streaked with gray yet, and his eyes were not too dead, nor his face so stern.

Knowing his mother was a former water spirit that gave birth to a soulless boy was a shock enough, but Haruka couldn't be more prepared at what he's seeing in their living room now. Inside the house, together with his parents, were Minoru, Brook, and Coach Sasabe, whose wands were all drawn out. Natsuki was also there, pregnant and flushed. They all were in their early twenties, and a determined expression was upon their faces. Brook's eye scar was still fresh, and he had more hair that hid his flapless ears. Minoru, without his glasses, looked exactly like Makoto. Goro was wearing a lurid green polo shirt with yellow grape patterns on it.

His coach. His former swimming coach, energetic and bumbling Sasabe Goro, who liked pizzas and magazines, was a wizard and was friends with his and Makoto's parents. Haruka felt certain his skull had already cracked; his brain must have swelled from all he was knowing.

"They kept mentioning the Ways," Haruka heard his mother say to everyone. "Lamine said Haru will be sacrificed to keep balance, as if the boy has any hand in what happened. If I still had my full undine power, the gods know what I would have done. I will plead with the Sea King if I must. I will go again tomorrow. There must be another way!"

"Sit, Neri," Hisoka said. "Don't strain yourself, please. It's been three days—"

"Indeed. Three days after I gave birth to our son, and now, they're taking him away. I have had several lifetimes of immortality, but no true happiness… This, the both of you, you are all I need. And they're taking Haru away. How do they think are we supposed to act on their order? Just accept and hand him over to die? Did they think we deliberately attempt to create a soulless child?  _Even_  Haruka's life, despite my bargain, they're taking him—" She cried into Hisoka's arms, grazing baby Haruka's forehead softly with her own.

"Then we will proceed with my plan," Hisoka said calmly.

"What plan?"

Hisoka hesitated. "Neri, I will transfer my soul to Haruka's body." He didn't look or sound desperate, nor afraid. He spoke as if this was simply the rational step they needed to take, and he looked down on baby Haruka with love. "I want him to live."

Nerissa pulled back, a look of pure horror in her eyes. "But — no, you cannot… Letting go of your soul violates the Ways of nature in itself — and how — ?"

Hisoka smiled sadly. "The people's title of me as Japan's greatest wizard will be for naught, if I can't even use my magic to save our son." He pointed to the center table. On it was the Brook Pensieve, together with an assortment of bottles with silvery-white stuff in them — the bottles Haruka saw on the staffroom table. "I have extracted my most important memories, which I wish for Haru to see someday. Neri, after I give my soul to him, you will leave for Minoru and Natsuki's house. I will find a place to stay. John and Goro will go with me. I will not be dead as long as my heart and brain function, but I cannot be with you and Haru. It will not be easy to explain to him, will it, having a father with no soul. You just say I died. It will be better if I were dead. I will lose my sense of self, my memory, everything."

"H-how will you do it exactly?"

"I have discussed this with Minoru and John yesterday. I have evoked spirits and souls of the dead before, but never have I done magic of this degree. The plan is, I will anchor my soul to his body the same way horcruxes — Dark, powerful objects, Neri — hold pieces of a human soul. But not with murder — I will take no life, even my own, I will just summon my soul away from my body. It is tricky, dangerous, and may be fatal for me and Haru, but it is the only way magic will permit my soul to latch on to anywhere else. The first fundamental Magical Law states that tampering with the deepest mysteries — the source of life, the essence of self — can only be done if one is prepared for consequences of the most extreme and dangerous kind. I can die, Neri, you must know this, or face something worse than death, for committing something of this extent.

"I don't know for sure how much of my soul will be maimed and broken, but since I'll ever do it once, I hope it will reach his body in good form. Even then, and no books of magic have expounded on this — there is no assurance that his body will not reject the transfer. There is no known case of a human body encasing another person's soul, except for Harry Potter of Britain. But he held only a fragment of somebody else's soul together with his own. Mine can feed off Haru's life energy and assimilate itself to his body completely, it may act independently, I don't know. Gods, we don't even know why exactly Haruka has no soul, but if doing this offers the possibility of a normal and healthy human life for him, I will do it. And I will do it alone, because if I kill our child in the process, it becomes my sin only.

"Everyone in this room has agreed to make an Unbreakable Vow with me, that if the plan becomes successful and I lose my humanity, they will be there for you and Haruka, and no word of this will ever be known. Breaking the terms will result in death. We made the Vow after you left to meet with the Salacian undines."

Everyone in the room was staring apprehensively at Nerissa, as if expecting her to break down any moment from the grimness of Hisoka's words. However, she only said quietly: "And if you survive?"

"What do you mean?"

"What if, Hisoka? What if you still retain a big part of your soul and Haru lives to be a human?"

"I don't know. My divining will weaken, certainly, and I may have to give up magic. It's not a problem at all if it happens, but as I told you, it is a very delicate, unsure situation."

Nerissa said nothing for a while; she sat in the couch and looked at everyone in silence, traces of disbelief, and fear, and then understanding on her face. "Humans really are different."

Goro blinked. "What? That's Hisoka's idea alone. We'll help of course, you are our friends, after all, but guy's plain weirder than all of us in this room, if you ask me, so don't get the wrong idea that we all are fully with him losing his soul like that, although of course it'd not be lost, just on Haru's body... Hisoka's always been a bit different, and that's saying a lot, because you're a bit, um, special yourself, heh heh —" Nobody laughed, and Brook gave him a disapproving look as if to say: "You  _really_  have to say that now?"

But Nerissa gave him a smile. "This force, this mysterious force that foils even the Ways  _—_ it's more special than living eternally or dying. Love. Humans' pureness of heart and soul, the power that even the greatest of elementals will never know. I only ever felt it completely after my soul was gifted to me."

"Oh," Goro said. "Yeah, that… yeah."

"And this is why I can't let you do what you want, Hisoka. You are not to give your soul to Haru alone. I'll also share mine."

Hisoka looked at his wife reprovingly, shock clear on his face. "Neri, that's foolishness. If you love our son, and me as well, at least let me go alone. You don't have to do this. Haru needs you."

"But we need you as well. I  _will_  share your burden, Hisoka."

"But if it goes horribly wrong, if our halfsouls don't latch fully to his body— at least let me die alone, Nerissa, you have sacrificed yourself enough!"

"In my lifetimes being the Black Wave, I have seen great ships sail into the waters, trusting even gales and darkness will be in favor with their journey. And I will do the same. Now get on to working and prove to everyone here that I married the most brilliant wizard in this country."

"What will the elementals do when they find out?" Hisoka asked.

"The Ways state that elementals are not to trifle with humans. They were only keen on taking Haru away because he's both human-undine  _and_ not human or undine at all, disrupting the balance and separation between the two realms. Make your plan work, Hisoka. If our son becomes fully human, they will not have a reason to hurt him."

"Even if I deliberately challenge the Ways with my magic?"

"I-I don't know. They only gave death as an option. The gods would easily take a life, but not bestow one..."

There was a pause, and Hisoka spoke. "If it works, and if we get to live with our son, it will be enough for me. Even if it means living as a broken man, and going into hiding. I'm afraid we'll have to stay away from the sea."

"No problem," said Nerissa, smiling. "Haru and I can always swim in the pool."

His parents' voices faded. Haruka looked around. The room was dissolving around him fast, and he was spinning round and round into nothingness. He thought he heard a baby cry as he was sucked into darkness once again.

 

 

"Haru," Haruka heard Makoto call, and he felt a light tap on his shoulder. Surprised, he felt like he was rising into the air, and steadied himself as he returned to the familiar interior of the staffroom, the pensieve's contents swirling in front of him. Makoto was behind him, while Rin was across him from the table, thrashing around and being restrained by Professor Brook.

"We've been all over the castle looking for you, and here you are, just poking your head into things," Rin grumbled. "Makoto was worried sick, did you know?"

"I'm sorry, Haruka," said Professor Brook. "These boys were breaking into the gargoyle by the door and I let them in. Now Matsuoka, you promised to calm down if I let you inside, so quit moving around, please."

"I-I'm not human," Haruka said weakly.

"Of course, you're not," yelled Rin. "You're a stupid slugbrain and I'll knock your head and your letter into that basin, you — wait, what?"

"What did you see in the basin, Haru?" asked Makoto gently.

Haruka looked at his friends and struggled to compose himself. Makoto, who he had been friends with for so long, who knew everything about him, did Makoto know of his abnormality, too? Was he instructed by his parents to keep mum about it because of the Vow? Maybe it's why he's always putting up with him... And Rin, it hadn't even been a full week that he knew Rin. He was loud, and brash, but he seemed pretty clever. What would Rin do if he discovered his secret? Would he mock him for it? Would he still want to be friends?

He now understood why his parents left him. Something about the sea and the pearl necklace triggered them to leave, and they sent him here to meet Brook and know more of their lives. But what he discovered, he could not simply tell Makoto and Rin. How was he supposed to tell people he was born without a soul, and his parents sacrificed each half of their souls for him? That his mother was a former water spirit that gave up immortality to be human? That his father could actually separate a soul from a body? He could not even fully believe yet that all these years, Hisoka had been cold to him because he'd been internally unstable and not too human. His father had loved him all along...

"I'm a mackerel," he said.

"Huh?" Rin and Makoto gazed at him in utter confusion, and Makoto looked especially tense.

"The pensieve shows people's desires," he lied, pointing to the basin. "In it, I saw myself as a mackerel, swimming together with a large school of mackerel."

"Um, okay," said Makoto.

"Seriously? said Rin. "Like we would believe that."

"Then don't," Haruka said sourly. "I'll be leaving, Professor Brook. Thank you for your time."

"There are other memor—" Brook began, but Haruka cut him off. "I know. I'll be back."

The three boys left the staff room with Haruka leading the way. His head still pounding painfully because of his mother's memory, he vaguely heard Rin and Makoto sharing to him their consultation with McGonagall and Hagrid being nice. All he could think about was the Brook Pensieve and how he  _was_  water.

 

 

* * *

_Chapter postscript on the blog. _In Chapter 11: BROOMSTICK BLUES, the Rinharu rivalry begins.__


	11. Broomstick Blues

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Be it about Potions or Flying, Haruka and Rin always find something to disagree on. Rin and Makoto figure out there’s something really strange going on—a thing far stranger than Haruka’s watery whims.

A blur of introductions, a flurry of spells. This was Haruka, Makoto, and Rin's first two weeks at Hogwarts. While there was so much to learn, it was as if the teachers were giving all the first years time to take in everything—to appreciate the beauty and mystery of magic first without being vexed and lost in formulas, wand work, and potion ingredients. Makoto was so far doing well. He had yet to give a wrong answer in any subject. All his Transfiguration exercises were very well done, too. Studious and helpful, he was easily becoming popular with his classmates and teachers. Rin, who in his first day accidentally covered one of his books with bogies, resolved to be more focused and controlled. In the following days, he was able to perfect the Curse of the Bogies, received ninety points for recitation, and scored top marks in a History of Magic quiz. Haruka, meanwhile, spent Herbology classes glancing longingly at the watering cans.

In spite of schoolwork, Makoto and Rin did not fail to notice Haruka's increasingly odd behavior. Haruka spent most of his classes staring out windows or doodling on parchment, ate very little, and looked like he wasn't sleeping at all. There was a late afternoon when he was gone for two hours and returned for dinner looking shaken. One night at the Great Hall, he didn't seem to notice he was writing down an essay with a spoon, not until Makoto gave him a nudge and Rin laughed himself hoarse. When Makoto and Rin told him again about how McGonagall got the mysterious letter for inspection, Haruka snapped and called them meddlesome, and insisted that nothing was wrong.

"You two stop your _nonsense_ ," Haruka said stiffly.

More than being confused, Rin was losing patience.

Haruka was a mystery: when he was quiet he made things come to life; when he talked, with frosty words and only slight curls of his lips, Rin found himself listening well (and retaliating hard). When Makoto and Rin found him swimming in the lake once, it was one of the rare times that Rin didn't have anything to say. He just stood in wonder, coming to terms with one very important thing. In the water, Haruka shone.

 

 

"Are you sure that isn't just how he is?" Rin asked Makoto on Wednesday morning, during Professor Binn's deadly dull lesson of the 1612 Goblin Rebellion. Because of the large dropout rate of students in History of Magic, Professor Binns now supplemented his lectures with an enchanted projector, set up by a student assistant. It wasn't much of a help; his droning voice still sent nearly everyone in class asleep.

Makoto stopped scribbling, not quite looking Rin in the eye. "Haru doesn't care much for school, but he's usually not this distracted," he replied. "Something must be bothering him. Wait, Rin—is that Gorlok or Gorlak?" He squinted, trying to read what was on the projector. "I can't see…"

"Gorlok. You should get glasses," Rin said. "Or sit in front."

"Thanks. Yeah, Haru told me that before. Maybe I'll get a pair next year."

Rin stopped writing, too. "Hey, Makoto. You still reckon Brook's up to something?"

"Ssssh, Rin, Professor Binns might hear you," Makoto whispered, nervously glancing at Binns. "What do you mean? Professor McGonagall already assured us that Professor Brook's on Haru's side." Makoto didn't sound too confident, however.

"Because I do. You remember last Wednesday, when Haru disappeared and then wrote homework with a spoon? Brook was a mess that day, right? He didn't even seem like himself. He couldn't properly hold his wand!"

"I do. But maybe Professor Brook was just — I don't know, tired?"

"The basin, though. Did you see the swirling silver bit in it? What _was_ that? That mackerel thing Haru told us— load of rubbish, if you ask me. I bet Haru went back to the staffroom. Met with Brook again, did some head-poking in the basin—"

Makoto sighed, and for a moment Rin saw a flash of reluctance in Makoto's face before his usual smile lit his eyes up. "I don't believe it, too. But if Haru's not yet prepared to talk about what he saw in the pensieve, I'm going to respect his decision. Let's just wait till he's ready." He held his quill firmly and resumed writing.

Rin stared at Makoto, who was now scrunching up his eyes at the blackboard, so much he almost looked cross-eyed. "That's _Borkaff_ the Bloodshot, not Barkoff," he said. He couldn't believe someone could be so kind.

 _Where does Makoto get all the patience? He seems so worried and yet he still considers Haru's feelings as more important than his own_. _  
_

"Oh, well," he said in a low voice. "Better channel my energies to books and Quidditch than Haru. Did you have a notice pinned in your common room, as well? Flying classes start tomorrow! I can't wait. That, and the Quidditch tryouts—"

"Er, Rin," Makoto said. "First years aren't allowed to join House teams yet. Professor McGonagall said so during the feast."

"What?"

"Maybe you weren't paying atten—"

"Mr. Matskeys," whizzed Professor Binns suddenly, closing his notes. The ghost professor seemed to take a liking on Rin after his perfect quiz. "Now if you'd please name all twenty goblin leaders for our class?"

Rin stood up, frustrated by Makoto's news. "Gorlok, Egrol the Beaten, Borkaff the Bloodshot, Gurmek, Girmilot…"

 

 

"It's okay, Rin," said Makoto soothingly during lunch, seeing Rin's dejected face. "You can try out for Quidditch next year."

"Brooms and balls," said Haruka, "and no water at all..."

"No, Haru," wailed Rin. "You don't _understand_!"

Rin and Haruka spent their meal staring daggers at one another.

 

 

Rin's troubles with Haruka peaked Wednesday afternoon during their Potions class. They were partners again for a potion called the Seestern Solution. Rin noticed how much Haruka's eyes shone when he saw twenty cauldrons, full of water, on the wooden desks. Eyes narrowing, he tugged at Haruka's robes. He still felt bothered about Quidditch and now Haruka was being a drag again.

"Hey," Rin said through gritted teeth. "I've gotten zero marks for every potion I made because _you're_ my partner, so you better pay attention to Snape now."

Eyes trained on a cauldron, Haruka was too busy unlacing his shoes to pay Rin any mind.

"I get it Haru, you're in _love_ with the cauldrons," Rin hissed while Snape lectured on the physical and chemical properties of starfish. "But Snape doesn't seem too pleased with you looking at his babies that way."

Haruka began peeling off his socks.

"What — are — you — doing?" he yanked Haruka's robes as hard as he could, forcing Haruka to keep still. "Listen to the lesson! Snape's looking at you!"

"I can't help it," Haruka murmured dreamily.

"What?"

"Just a dip."

"Are you freaking serious—?" Rin watched in alarm as Haruka clambered onto one of the wooden desks, knocking over a pair of bronze scales and their potion kits. Haruka submerged his feet into a cauldron, sighing as if extremely relieved. Atop the desk, he towered over them all—he stood in the cauldron with his eyes closed as water lapped against his shins. All their classmates gaped open-mouthed at him and Rin. Serafina Murceo, a Slytherin, looked like she was having a fit from too much laughter. The Hufflepuffs exchanged confused looks.

The class didn't get to know the applications of tetrodotoxin in making counterpoisons. Snape snarled mid-sentence and strode over to Haruka and Rin's desk, his black robes rippling behind him.

"Idiot boy!" Eyes glittering murderously, Snape pointed his wand on Haruka's cauldron. The water in it vanished instantly. Haruka opened his eyes. He looked mildly surprised at Snape and got off the desk, looking quite _happy_ and just very slightly abashed. Snape must have seen Haruka's pleased face, as his own soon turned dark with displeasure.

"Fifty points from Hufflepuff, Nanase, for having the cheek to disrupt my class," Snape whispered savagely, his hooked nose pressed threateningly close against Haruka's face. "And detention for this ridiculous stunt of yours. Now, get out of my sight."

"Sorry, Professor," Haruka said, now looking as if he just realized what he had done. He calmly hoisted his bag up his back and walked out of the classroom in silence. Rin looked like he was struck with a Stunning Spell.

"As I was saying," Snape said to a gaggle of shocked faces, "tetrodotoxin is a powerful poison secreted by the sea star. It is used to—"

"Professor," Cyperus Fuschiafische raised a trembling hand. He shuddered when Snape gave him a look more poisonous than any sea star's. He was a Hufflepuff, and one of Haruka's roommates. "Please, but now that you sent Haruka out, he will not be able to make today's potion..."

"I very well know that, Mr. Fushy— Mr. Fish— _Mister_. I don't remember asking you to speak."

"But professor, that means Haru will be getting zero points today. You've docked points and given him detention already, please—"

"Silence."

"Please, sir—"

" _Clearly_ ," Snape said coldly, "Hufflepuffs in this class do not know respect." Most of the Slytherins guffawed, but Rin looked stony-faced as he glared at Snape. "Five points from Hufflepuff, and if I hear another irrelevant word from you, you'll have to leave this classroom as well."

Cyperus turned a violent shade of red and kept silent.

At that moment, Rin thought of Haruka and walls again. _The git. I warned him and he didn't listen to me. What's with him?_ He looked up from his parchment and glanced around as casually as he could. Snape had returned to the front table, continuing his lecture as if nothing happened, but it was obvious that everyone was distracted. His Slytherin seatmates were exchanging barely-heard whispers about Haruka being a weirdo not just in Potions, and a Hufflepuff girl looked tearful. Serafina and two other Slytherin girls were wiping their faces, too, but Rin didn't like the smirks plastered on their faces.

Scowling as his quill blotted his parchment, Rin let his thoughts wander to Quidditch, to his other classes, and to Haruka.

He first met Haruka breaking into an aquarium...

Makoto said Haruka was a great swimmer who actually swam like a dolphin…

Haruka repeatedly tried to jump into the lake on their way to Hogwarts…

Mackerel…

And today, the water in the cauldrons, with Haruka's feverish whisper: " _I can't help it_..."

_Could Haru be…?_

Snape ended his lecture and signaled the start of the practical. Rin spent the class stewing cubed starfish, suddenly remembering his father and forming a theory.

For the first time in two weeks, he received full marks in Potions.

 

 

At dinner, Haruka dropped into a seat next to Makoto in the Slytherin long table. He looked so pale and careworn. "You look terrible," said Rin, distracted from telling Makoto his theory by Haruka's tired face. Haruka replied with a wide, long yawn, his hand automatically reaching for a jug of pumpkin juice.

"'Evening, Haru," said Makoto, who was feeding Yukio some sausages. "Where's Sabainu?"

"In my room. Sleeping." Haruka's eyes fell on Makoto's copy of _A Millenia of Myths and Magic_ , which was propped against a jug. He frowned. "Give your eyes some rest."

"Ahhh, well," Makoto said, fidgeting with his sweater, "I was just looking something up." He looked apprehensively at the staff table, and seemed to force a smile as his eyes met Haruka's.

"Seriously, Haru," Rin pressed. "I thought you're the Bloody Baron for a moment." He looked at Haruka and Makoto intently. "What's wrong with you two? It's one thing for Haru to look grumpier than usual, but even you, Makoto, you don't look too well."

"Well," said Makoto, "I have something to tell you about Professor Br—"

"Oh, look who we have here," Serafina Murceo said airily, her light gray eyes spiteful as she gave Haruka a look. " _The_ Dufferpuff, paying respects to our side of the Great Hall." She sat across the three boys, her friends Jill Borgin and Iravana Williams flanking her. Jillian was smiling unpleasantly. Iravana looked shyly at Makoto, blushed, and dunked her arm into her bowl of fruit. (Makoto pretended to not notice.)

Rin's nostrils flared. "What'd you just call Haru?"

" _Dufferpuff_ ," said Serafina. "Because you know, he's a total numskull in everything? I _especially_ reserved that name for Hufflepuffs but I figured not all of them are as stupid as he is. Lovely name, don't you think? For someone who goes around wetting his feet in the middle of a class and not being able to answer the most basic of Charms questions..." She gave the boys a nasty, sweet little smile.

Rin gave a hollow laugh. "Funny, very funny, Serafina. I just happened to notice you can't peel your eyes off Haru in Potions. You can't stop talking about him in the common room, either. ' _Haruka has stupid blue eyes.'_ ' _Haruka wears his tie loosely.' 'Haruka likes pumpkin juice.'_ Yeah _,_ I heard those. That's a lot of attention you give for someone you say is an idiot."

Serafina turned bright red, and there was an edge in her voice as she replied: "I _only_ talk about him because of how weird he is."

"Well," Rin said, "as I can see you're really interested in Haru's craziness, let me tell you something. You know that thing he did with the cauldron in Potions? It was a dare. He lost a bet on me and I pricked him to annoy Snape. Pretty cool, huh? I bet not even you will have the gall to go splash around in Snape's class."

The girls looked shocked at this, and Rin gave Serafina a satisfied grin. "Now you could add that thing to your list of 'Why I can't shut up about Nanase Haruka'," he said coolly.

Blushing furiously, Serafina left, her friends scrambling after her.

Rin went back to his garlic soup as if nothing happened.

"A lie," Haruka said, examining his goblet of pumpkin juice.

"That was… a bit unkind, Rin," Makoto said, looking shocked even as a smile crept to his face.

Rin gave his soup a dark look. "If you hear half the things Serafina keeps saying about people here, Makoto, you'll probably think I'm an angel. She thinks she's the coolest thing to happen at Hogwarts. I heard she's really rich, and well I _think_ her eyes are pretty, but she's rude and annoying as heck. She thinks she's the smartest, too, but the school knows she only comes second to you in Transfiguration. Isn't that right, Haru?"

Haru, who shared Double Transfiguration with Makoto, just shrugged. "Why did you lie to her? I _wanted_ to soak, you got nothing to do with it."

"I don't like it when my friends are made fun of," Rin replied.

Makoto beamed, but Haruka just kept looking at his goblet. " _You_ make fun of me everyday."

"That _doesn't_ count," said Rin, looking flustered.

"Please, you guys," said Makoto. "Stop bickering—"

"Well, aren't you going to thank me?" Rin said to Haruka. "I just saved your face!"

"No," said Haruka. "'Don't remember asking you to do so."

Rin glared at him.

Makoto looked at the staff table again, shook his head slightly, and reached for a lumpy platter covered in silver foil. "Here, Haru," he smiled warmly as he pushed a platter of grilled mackerel toward Haruka. "I hope you like it."

"He still hasn't thanked me!" seethed Rin.

Haruka lifted his eyes from the goblet, stared at the mackerel, and gave it a little sniff. For a heartbeat he looked like he witnessed a miracle. The mackerel looked fresh and succulent, glazed and golden brown. Smelling of lime and soy sauce, it was very far from the canned ones he and Sabainu kept eating in his dormitory room. But he pushed the platter away. "Not hungry." He downed another goblet of pumpkin juice instead.

"All you're having these past meals are water and pumpkin juice," Makoto said anxiously. "Eat this, at least. It's your favorite, isn't it?"

"I don't want to," said Haruka.

"You ungrateful piece of—" said Rin.

"Rin, please don't—" said Makoto, looking rather pink.

"D'you know," growled Rin, "Makoto went to the kitchens last night for this? Alone! He asked the house-elves to make this for you today."

"Is that true, Makoto?"

"Well — yeah. I'm worried about you. You'd be having Flying lessons, tomorrow, too, and you need the energy—"

"You shouldn't have done that. Don't do it again." Haruka stood up and ambled away, muttering something about "bathrooms" and "nosy people".

"You're a pain!" he yelled to Haruka between mouthfuls of soup, seemingly forgetting he still had a theory to share. He looked at Makoto, who was staring blankly at Haruka's retreating back. "Can you believe him? After my lie to save his buttcheeks and your effort on the mackerel!"

"This is the first time mackerel failed to cheer him up."

"Okay, so? What does that mean? Really, you two freak me out a bit. Don't tell me you can predict his thoughts through fish, too?"

"It means," Makoto said quietly, "the thing that's bothering Haru— it's _serious_ , Rin." Makoto closed his book, but not before Rin caught glimpses of words like "legendary magical artifacts" and "mind receptacles".

" _Oh_. Really?" Rin said. As if suddenly remembering, he straightened up in his seat. "You were about to tell us something about Brook!"

 

 

"Yes," said Makoto, leaning closer and balling his hands to stop them from shaking. "After Defense of the Dark Arts today, I immediately packed my things and left to meet you and Haru here. As I was passing a corridor, I met Professor Brook."

"Okay, and then?"

Makoto's eyes bulged in fear. "I left the classroom with Professor Brook still _inside_. Yasmin and Violet were consulting their quiz results with him. The one in the corridor, he— he wasn't the same. He's balding, and tall, and had a scar across his left eye, but whoever he was, he wasn't Professor Brook. He was drenched from the waist down—"

"What?"

"The Professor Brook I saw in the corridor, his eyes were different—"

"Not watering and stuff?"

"No. They weren't gray even, but some sort of gold-brown. He smelled strongly of seaweed, too, and—" Makoto was shaking so hard now that Yukio, who was curled in his lap, jumped away in astonishment, hissing.

"And?"

"He h-had ears…"

"WHAT?" Rin would've laughed, if not for the terror in Makoto's eyes that seemed to seep its way into his own stomach.

 

 

Later that night, Rin eased a chipped picture frame of his family up his bedside table, muttering curses under his breath. One of his roommates, Keith, knocked it off his table again. He slumped into his silver-and-green bedspread, staring at the picture frame—at his father and mother's smiling faces, at his sister Gou kissing him cheerfully on the cheek.

He remembered. He had hidden one midnight in Mr. Matsuoka's boat, behind a cooler and a couple of tackle boxes, eager to tag along in his father's next fishing trip. He was five years old then. His parents forbade him and Gou to be out at sea. It was very dangerous, especially when it's dark, they said, but Rin was having none of it. He thought, if his father was brave enough to go fish even at night, then there would be no reason to fear the water. It was this midnight when he discovered he was a wizard, and that his parents were magical, too.

_I made it, Mom, Dad. Solid steps to my wizarding dreams. Almost two weeks at Hogwarts, and I've survived._

Yet it was in a way he never expected to.

He had made an elaborate and ambitious plan for himself for what would be his seven years at Hogwarts. Friends, they weren't really his priority. Relationships were messy and teaming up with people often had repercussions that outweighed benefits, as he had learned the hard way. He would try to get on good terms with important people, he thought, but that would just be because he'd be needing connections someday. What he deemed important were his subjects and his reputation. He'd be an honor student, a Quidditch star, a formidable wizard-in-training. He'd be _great_ , he envisioned. He'd make his father proud.

So far, he'd spent ten days telling a rich, beautiful girl off for calling Haruka names, getting zero points for six consecutive potions (he never got below ninety-five percent in any of his Muggle exams), making detailed table-hopping schedules, and being dragged into an unsettling business between a Hogwarts teacher and a water freak of a kid. He shifted in his bed, tucking his arms under his head. These things weren't part of his plans. He didn't even seem like himself at all. Snapping at Serafina was an impulse that surprised him, as was the urge to stop people from taunting Haruka, no matter how frustrating and weird he could be.

_Maybe I should've stopped at the menagerie. Maybe I shouldn't have searched for Haru and Makoto's compartment at the train. If I weren't friends with either of them, my life at Hogwarts would've been easier. I wouldn't be fearing for my and someone else's life like I do now._

Because what on earth was going on with Haruka and Brook?

Who was it that Makoto saw?

And if his theory about Haruka were real…

He closed his eyes.

Everything was complicated.

Still, he didn't regret any of it. Not at all, really.

Knowing Makoto and Haruka was one of the great things he held on to here, everyday. He liked them a great deal; Makoto with his calming smiles, Haruka with his strange shining presence. He was just worried for all of them.

He fell into an uneasy sleep, dreams of Quidditch yo-yoing with bizarre images of Brook's gaping, water-filled tunnel ears.

 

 

Rin woke up next morning with a start. His roommates Peter and Keith were tickling his nose with a miniature broomstick. "Wake up, Matsuoka!" Their other roommates were still asleep.

Still groggy, he reached for his alarm clock, and let out a string of expletives that made his two pesky roommates pause. "It's four in the morning. _Four_. Get off of my bed."

Keith was as tall as Makoto, but he was about as thick as Makoto's thigh. Mumbling equally vulgar words, he jumped from Rin's four-poster. Stocky, bushy-haired Peter followed suit.

"Huh. And here I thought you're as excited with Quidditch as we are. Man, I can't wait to trample those Dufferpuffs," squeaked Keith.

Flying lessons would be starting today. Hufflepuff and Slytherin would be learning together, scheduled at eight-thirty in the morning, while Gryffindor and Ravenclaw were scheduled at three-thirty in the afternoon. Rin didn't forget this. In fact, he checked the noticeboard everyday, feeling a surge of warmth every time he read "Flying lessons" scrawled in one of the fliers. He would be learning to fly, finally.

Feeling fully awake after hearing "Dufferpuff," he wrestled himself off the covers and looked at Keith scathingly. "Serafina's been teaching you that word."

"Yeah," said Peter, snickering with Keith. "Brilliant, isn't it? She has a name for you, too, if you still haven't heard. _Jagtooth_."

A very well-aimed hexed pillow sent Peter and Keith flying across the room.

 

 

"Where's Haru?" asked Makoto worriedly as they ate breakfast.

"For the eleventh time, I don't know," said a disgruntled Rin, buttering a piece of toast. "He's probably serenading a pail of water somewhere—" He stopped, seeing the look on Makoto's face. "I'll see him in Flying today, okay. I'll drag him to lunch if needed. Then you can tell him about Brook and hopefully he'd spill whatever it was he saw in the basin, and we'd finally have some— I don't know— _peace of freaking mind_."

Makoto gave a slight nod. He fumbled with the silver foil covering three pieces of freshly-baked mackerel, which he requested again from the kitchens. "I was just hoping he'd show up for breakfast and finally eat…"

"And if it would calm you down, I'd bring that to him," said Rin, snatching the foil-covered platter. "Now, stop worrying, for goodness' sake."

Makoto nodded again, this time with a smile on his face.

"If your class ends early, you can go see me in the library. Good luck with flying, Rin. Tell Haru I wished him luck, too."

"Yeah, thanks. What are you researching on?"

"How a pensieve works."

Comprehension dawned on Rin's face. "So _that's_ why you were reading that extremely heavy book—"

"Yeah. I know Haru has his reasons for not telling us about the pensieve, so while waiting, I decided to read up on it. _A Millennia of Myths and Magic_ only listed "pensieve" as a "mind receptacle", though — there weren't any explanations — so I'm going to read up more."

Rin looked at Makoto. While he himself loved books, frustration over Quidditch and Haruka got the better of him, and he didn't even think of doing what Makoto did. It was a good idea, reading — even when Haruka had the talkativeness of a pebble, refusing to talk about Brook and the pensieve, Makoto would at least be able to make plans and curb his worrying through books. Somehow, Rin didn't feel as bitter as he did when some of their classmates called Makoto the best in their year. A part of him was agreeing.

"Brilliant," he said to Makoto. "Now while you're at it, can you loan _Bettelheim's Broom Handbook_ for me?"

Makoto's eyes crinkled again as he smiled. "Sure!"

 

"Everyone stand by a broomstick," Madam Hooch, the Flying instructor, said. She looked at them, hawk-like, as she stood in front of thirty broomsticks lying neatly on the ground. They were to learn flying on the smooth, flat lawn on a side of the Hogwarts grounds, which looked a vivid green under the morning sun.

Rin looked down at his broom. Compared to Haruka's, his had smoother twigs and wasn't as shabby-looking. Haruka's broom handle was chipped in places and was sagging in the middle, looking as if it would snap in two if someone mounted it. He wanted to tell Haruka this, but as Haruka wasn't speaking to him yet nor acknowledging he was in the same lawn, he decided he wouldn't talk, too.

"Stick out your right hand over your broom," said Madam Hooch at the front, "and say 'Up!' "

"UP!" everyone shouted.

Rin's broom jumped into his hand at once, as did Haruka's. The others' broomsticks barely rolled on the ground. Rin stole a glance at Haruka, but Haruka kept his eyes firmly on the broom. Rin caught Serafina looking at him with a weird expression on her face. Her broom lay still on the ground.

Madam Hooch taught them how to mount their brooms, corrected postures and grips, and showed them how to kick off from the ground. "Now," she said, "when I blow my whistle, you kick off from the ground," she said. "Keep your brooms steady, rise a couple of feet, and then come straight back down by leaning forward slightly. On my whistle — three — two —one!"

Rin kicked his broomstick, hard, and up he went, soaring through the air, his hair and robes whipping against his face and skin. A wonderful feeling surged through him. This was great, not unlike swimming, he thought, for the air felt as alive as water did, and he was sliding through it, feeling it... Up where he was, he was seeing sights he never saw before—

Suddenly, his broomstick jerked and made funny noises, shooting about a hundred meters upwards.

"What—?" He grasped the broom handle tightly in both hands, trying to steady it. What was going on? The broom was supposed to come back down as he leaned forward, but instead, it spun around jerkily, still a good hundred meters from the ground, as if trying to get rid of him. After one mighty lurch, the broomstick managed to unseat him, and Rin was dangling off it with one hand, barely hearing the scared shrieks of his classmates and Madam Hooch's shouts from where he was. There was a crack, the broomstick burst into pieces and was gone, he was holding on to a piece of wood, and he was falling, fast…

He didn't see Haruka speed toward him from the ground until he heard a mildly annoyed voice: " _What_ are you doing?" Haruka turned his broomstick sharply toward Rin, and, letting go of the handle, grabbed a fistful of Rin's robes with both hands. They were both gasping as he hoisted Rin onto the broomstick. Even with both of them cramped in it, the broomstick didn't break as Rin imagined it would, and Haruka smoothly maneuvered it to the ground, making no sound as they landed on the grass.

Madam Hooch goggled at them, speechless. After a minute of checking both Rin and Haruka for injuries, she managed to say—

"NEVER — In all my years of teaching — Nanase —"

White with shock, none of their classmates seemed to want to mount a broomstick again.

"Mr. Matsuoka's broomstick, I strongly believe, has been jinxed. This has never happened before to a Flying class for first years," barked Madam Hooch, prodding Keith upward with one hand (his knees buckled when he saw Rin dashing headfirst to the ground). Her piercing, yellow eyes roved around every aghast, sweaty face. "I would never have believed it of any of you, you are too young, inexperienced — someone from the higher years must've thought this was a funny prank — if I ever find out who did it, I assure you that person will be expelled." She dismissed the class, asking Haruka and Rin to stay behind. "Mr. Matsuoka, Mr. Nanase, you will come with me. I need your statements for a written report of today's incident."

As they walked back to the castle, Madam Hooch asked: "Have you flown before, Mr. Nanase?"

"No," came Haruka's reply.

"Touched a broomstick, heard of Quidditch?"

"No."

"You were in excellent form out there," she said briskly, sounding impressed. "Not many first years can even hold a broomstick properly, least of all rescue someone falling from a hundred-foot dive! A natural, yes, you are — I suppose Gary will be pleased with you —"

"Why will Professor Egreggy be pleased with me?" Haruka asked, looking confused. Professor Gary Egreggy was the Head of Hufflepuff House.

"Because he's always badgering me to observe upcoming Quidditch talent in the Hufflepuffs I teach. You see, Hufflepuff hasn't won the Quidditch Cup in a hundred and fifty years. You will make a good Seeker for your House team, Nanase."

"Excuse me, Madam," said Rin, "but first years aren't allowed to be in House teams yet—"

"They can be allowed, Mr. Matsuoka, if they're good enough."

Rin couldn't believe his ears. _Haru, playing Quidditch?_

 

 

* * *

_Next chapter: a price is paid, unfairly so. Postscript on the blog._


	12. Fish Out of Water

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the lull in updating. The holidays were a busy time. I hope this chapter makes up for that.
> 
> Big thanks again for dropping by! Please share your thoughts on my writing. Favorite/least liked chapter(s) or parts, perhaps? Whether I've been too much of a Blibbering Humdinger? :D Help me make the story better.
> 
> Aaand happy new year!
> 
> Now, to Part One's final chapter:

The air was rent with deafening cheers as seven figures in blue robes walked into Hogwarts' Quidditch pitch, joining seven more clad in scarlet. Each had a broomstick in their hands. It was finally November, and amid gray skies and biting, icy winds, Quidditch season had begun.

Peril, too, was looming ever closer.

"Thanks for coming here," Makoto said happily to Haruka and a manic-looking Rin, who both joined him in the top row of the Gryffindor stand.

"No problem," said Rin, waving his hand dismissively as his eyes surveyed the pitch. "I won't be sitting here next match, though. Y'know, it'd be Hufflepuff against Slytherin."

Haruka grunted something that sounded distinctly like "Sure."

"That's okay," Makoto replied, though he wondered where he'd go next time — would he support Rin's House or Haruka's? What if he just skipped the match? He could spend his time on the library doing more research. Then again, people said Quidditch matches were too good to miss. _Maybe I'll still watch from Gryffindor,_ he thought.  _I'll just wear both Hufflepuff and Slytherin_ _colors to show that I support them both_.

A spirited shriek of "Go, Gryffindor!" brought him out of his musing. "Ah, Rin, why don't you sit next to Haru? It's a bit cramped there," he said, pointing to Rin's seat. They sat pressed among a group of Gryffindor fifth years who were all clutching scarlet flags, and Rin was almost at the rightmost edge of the top row.

Rin gave Haruka a frown and immediately looked away. "No, don't mind me," he said in a chilly voice. "I'd rather sit here than—"

 _No_ , Makoto thought, biting his lower lip as he stared nervously from Rin to Haruka. _W_ _hy did you have to say that, Rin?_ Within a minute, the two were at it again.

"If you'd rather squash yourself than sit next to me," Haruka said coldly.

"Oh, so you're talking to me now?" asked Rin, the crazed enthusiasm in his eyes suddenly replaced with indignation.

"Guys, _please_ _,_ " Makoto said despairingly. Ever since Haruka was offered a place in the Hufflepuff Quidditch team after saving Rin from a fall, Rin had been behaving oddly. First he was silent and just kept giving Haruka pointed looks. He then started saying things like "They want you to be a Seeker? My, what would _I_ give to be a Seeker, too" and "So, have you joined yet?" with hints of jealousy in his voice. Haruka said he wasn't interested in joining at all ("There's no water involved") despite a good deal of pleading from Professor Egreggy and reproach from Madam Hooch. Some time after that, Rin was back to his old, loud self again, and kept urging Haruka to accept the Quidditch offer. Needless to say, the constant badgering didn't go too well with Haruka, and most of their meals together after that were spent bickering, with tense silence and really bad acting (just how many times could they pretend the other didn't exist?)

He knew why Rin and Haruka both acted that way. More than not being offered a chance to join his House's Quidditch team, Rin had been on the receiving end of really terrible taunts these past weeks. Many didn't believe his broomstick had been jinxed; they thought he was just a lousy flier. It didn't help that on their next joint flying class, he almost fell from his broomstick again (due to nerves than lack of skill, but nobody cared about this difference). It wasn't supposed to make him feel too bad. Very few among the first years actually worked their brooms. And nobody compared to Rin in terms of skill during their next lessons; Rin had vastly improved in just a short while. He tried explaining this to Rin, but Rin wouldn't listen. "Haru was able to do it well from the start," Rin had said stubbornly. "Even you did okay."

Haruka hated the fuss. His feat of saving Rin earned him the nickname of "Nanase the Knight" and quite the attention of many at Hogwarts, particularly girls. When news broke that he was handpicked by Hufflepuff Quidditch captain Kenneth Reach to be their team's Seeker, Haruka barely joined Makoto and Rin for meals. "You expect me to eat with all those people staring at me?" he remembered Haruka saying angrily.

Makoto tried countless times to explain their sides to the other, to no avail. As days passed and school work became steadily heavier (with Hermione and Snape giving the most homework), they only met for meals and their double classes. Since Haruka and Rin weren't talking with one another or even showing up much at the Great Hall, their supposed talk of the pensieve and Brook kept getting postponed. Makoto sighed. He had already collected two inches of parchment on articles featuring pensieves, all clamoring to be discussed.

Now, he invited them both to watch the first Quidditch match of the season on Gryffindor's stand. It was an ideal opportunity to bond, he planned. Or, as he heard Rin and Haruka's abrasive voices, it was supposed to be...

"I find it easier to talk to you when you're not spouting Quidditch nonsense," he heard Haruka say to Rin.

"What?" sputtered Rin. Several of the fifth years around them turned to look at him. "So it's all nonsense to you, that's it? I was just persuading you to join your House team because it's a _once_ in a lifetime opportunity! Imagine if you joined. You'd be the youngest Hogwarts Quidditch player ever after Harry Potter!"

"I only swim freestyle."

" _That_ ," Rin snarled, "is what's nonsense. I hate to break it you to you, but there's no swimming pool here."

"There's a lake," Haruka said calmly.

"Go on, then! Teach the giant squid how to swim freestyle in the lake!"

"Rin, Haru, listen to me—" Makoto began, but Rin cut him off.

"You've been given a chance many others"—Rin wiped angry tears off his face as he faced Haruka—"would kill to be given, and you turned it down, just because you _only_ swim freestyle. You really are as thick as Serafina and the others say." He stopped, realized what he just said, and mumbled a quick, "No, I didn't mean—"

"Sharing their sentiments now?" Haruka spat.

"Please," Makoto said sternly. "Haru. Rin. That's enough."

Rin was holding his binoculars tightly as if his strength depended on it. "You know, Haru, I don't understand you," he said, his voice shaking. "Is that what you say to everyone who tries to be your friend? That you don't need them? You're cold to me, to everyone, even to Makoto! You won't listen to us! You won't answer our questions! And then you go rejecting your House's offer, why? Because you're too _great_? You think you don't need anyone else to play against other teams? Think you can win the Quidditch Cup all on your own, maybe because you're able to sprout multiple arms to catch balls?" He convulsed with unpleasant laughter. "You don't even seem to hate flying! Up there, it's obvious how you like it!"

Haruka's fists were balled and very white.

"Rin, stop shouting," Makoto said. _No, it has come to this_ , he thought miserably. Their "bonding" was turning into a nightmare. No day seemed to pass without Haruka and Rin disagreeing over something since their first meeting at the menagerie, but they hadn't argued as seriously as this before.

"No. He has to hear, Makoto! Don't go scuttling to his side again," Rin yelled through the din, as if he didn't just hear Makoto telling Haruka off. "You've been spending hours in the library doing unnecessary work because he won't talk!"

"Makoto—what?" asked Haruka, who didn't know about him researching in the library.

Makoto sighed again. "Rin, please calm down, I'm not scuttling to anyone's side. And yes, Haru, I drop by the library on my free time."

But Rin wouldn't calm down. "Why are you even putting up with him? Haru doesn't trust us. Well it's okay on my part, I _hardly_ know him, but what about you? You're supposed to be best friends. But he doesn't trust you, does he, Makoto? That business with the pensieve, it's been weeks... But no, never mind you losing sleep over him possibly dying any day! Just keep acting like nothing's wrong at all!"

More people were staring at the three of them now. Makoto heard someone mutter "These freakin' kids. How'd you do _Silencio_ again?"

Haruka looked at Rin, and for a moment, Makoto thought he would hit Rin with his binoculars. But Haruka didn't, he just spoke in a strangely mellow voice: "That's not how it is."

"Why was it _you_?" Rin said bitterly, who seemed beyond listening now. "You don't care about anything. Why couldn't it be me?"

"Rin..." Makoto whispered.

Haruka opened his mouth again to speak, but his voice was drowned by the crowd's "They're off, they're off!" following Madam Hooch's whistle. Rin looked away from both of them, moved closer to the edge, and jammed his binoculars hard over his eyes. "Shut up, Haru, or I won't be able to focus on the match."

 

 

Maureen Skreetle, a sixth year Ravenclaw, was doing the commentary.

"Hit by a Bludger to the chest, Clarissa Natspring of Ravenclaw drops the Quaffle — caught by Chaser Abel Gomez, still of Ravenclaw, now speeding off toward the goal posts — blocked there by Gryffindor Keeper Papyrus Fuschiafische — damn, what a mouthful, Pyp — Quaffle now in Gryffindor with Mikoshiba Seijuro in possession — Seekers Lily Luna Potter and Garvic Gewgaw still on the lookout for the Golden Snitch — BAM! That's another Bludger from Gryffindor Beater Hugo Weasley —"

Makoto glanced at his left side and saw Haruka standing very still, his binoculars planted firmly on his face.

"Natspring's back in the game, looking rather purple in the face from that blow but still smashingly attractive — ehe, sorry, Professor — Quaffle's now in Gryffindor! Chaser Ben Cobb now in possession, dodges Briana Oldbrine, passes to Mikoshiba — that, folks, was a second close to a Bludger in the head —

In spite of himself, Makoto grinned. Quidditch was truly exciting; he found himself gripping his binoculars really hard and in a far corner of his mind, he saw himself wearing scarlet robes, too, and flying... It was all quickly replaced however by thoughts of Haruka and Rin's fight.

" _...He doesn't trust you, does he, Makoto?"_

"And Mikoshiba Seijuro scores! Ten points for Gryffindor!"

Fifty minutes into the match, Rin and Makoto were bouncing up and down their seats screaming jeers ("That Mikoshiba bloke sure looks dodgy to me!") and cheers ("Don't say that, Rin, he's from my House and he seems really nice! Go, Mikoshiba!"), and on and on the two went, and Maureen's voice rang clearly, until—

"AND GRYFFINDOR WINS, 180-60!"

 

 

"Now _that_ was great," said Rin, looking flushed and excited, still hungover by the match to go squabbling with Haruka again.

"Yeah, it was!" nodded Makoto fervently. "Isn't it, Haru?"

"Yeah," replied Haruka.

 _Okay, they have both calmed down_ , Makoto thought brightly. _Maybe if I just talked a bit more, they wouldn't_ _fight_ _... But then, how do I make them_ _patch things up_ _? Come on, Makoto, think..._

"Did you see Seijuro do that thing with his broom?" he asked tentatively, as they left the stands and joined other students walking back to the castle. "I thought he was going to fall but he didn't!"

"Looked easy to me," said Rin, sounding unimpressed.

Makoto chuckled. "Okay, if you say so, Rin. Haru, weren't you going to say something before the match? What is it?" he asked, looking hopeful.

Haruka's ears went pink as he mumbled "I just don't want you getting into trouble because of me." He sprinted away as fast as he could, leaving a beaming Makoto and a confused Rin standing on the grounds.

"Where's he going?" asked Rin, looking guiltily at his sneakers. "I was about to say I'm sorry."

There was a certain bounce in Makoto's steps as they walked toward the castle. So he was right after all. Haruka didn't want them to be involved in the pensieve business because he'd been worried, too. Keeping it from them was not a matter of trust but of safety; Haruka was only too embarrassed to linger after such a confession so he ran away.

But what was it, Makoto wondered, that distressed Haruka to the point of keeping it all secret?

He put a hand on Rin's shoulder. "He's concerned about us, too, Rin," he said, looking thoughtful as they walked. "Haru's really stubborn and difficult to talk to at times. He grew up thinking he has to do everything independently. He cooks for himself, takes care of his own laundry, and even when he stays at home, he doesn't let Mom fuss over him too much. I don't think he'll admit to needing anyone if he can help it. But over the years, we've formed a habit. I don't even remember how we came by it or when. Whenever he's in a bathtub or pool, I always give him a hand to hold on to. You know, so he can get out easily."

"Huh?" said Rin. "What does that have to do with what happened today?"

"Haru trusts that I'll always pull him out of the water."

A group of Gryffindors passed by them, their faces streaked with red paint. "Big Blaze is the man!" one of them said.

"I _still_ don't get it, Makoto."

Makoto smiled. "I think it means he trusts people and he's willing to accept help, even if he's silent about it."

"You can say that," said Rin sadly. "You've known him for _years_. I don't have the ability to read his mind or interpret his words as something else... nicer."

"Well, you know him now," said Makoto, his eyes twinkling wisely. "That's a good point to start, isn't it?"

Rin sighed. "I was a prick at the stand, wasn't I?"

"It's okay," Makoto said, still smiling. "I think you've made some very good points. Come on now. We can talk to Haru when we're inside. I'm not entirely blameless."

"What?" Rin sounded incredulous. "Seriously, you've got nothing to do with it—"

" _I do._ I already found out all I can about pensieves, Rin, but I held back from telling you two. I was waiting and waiting for the right moment, but earlier, as you were talking with Haru, I realized it was wrong of me to do so. I should've told you and Haru as soon as I could. It could've helped. I should've been, um, _dynamic_? Is that the correct English word?"

Rin nodded and finally smiled. "I can't believe you're asking me about English words when just an hour ago I yelled at you. Sorry, Makoto."

Together they walked back to the castle, rewinding the highlights of the day's Quidditch match with much fervor, and almost knocking a couple of girls behind them when they reenacted Seijuro's feint with his broom.

 

 

They didn't see Haruka in the castle, however, even at dinner.

"Don't worry now," Makoto said to Rin, who kept looking at the Great Hall's entrance guiltily. "Maybe he's already in his common room. We'll talk to him tomorrow."

The Gryffindor common room was still packed when Makoto crawled into the Fat Lady's portrait hole (the password was "Birdlime"). Bright red and gold fireworks danced around the ceiling and a table by the fireplace was replete with cakes and bottles of butterbeer, a scarlet streamer with the words "Go, Lions!" hanging on top of it.

As he was mulling over places Haruka's possibly at if he wasn't back in the Hufflepuff common room, a very pretty seventh year approached him and handed him a butterbeer. "Hey, Tachibana, right? Come join! There's still a lot of food left."

"Um, thanks. Please call me Makoto," he said shyly to the girl, who he recognized as the Gryffindor Quidditch team's Seeker, Lily Luna Potter. "You were really great out there," he added before he could stop himself. Soon he was as red as the scarlet flag he was holding. He took a swig of his butterbeer nervously.

"I'll be leaving Hogwarts soon so I need to give every match my best shot. I hope I will," said Lily Luna. "Anyway, thanks, call me L." She waved a hand at him and left, now handing more butterbeers to three girls who just came out of the portrait hole. Makoto saw the girls pointing at a boy with red hair, and soon they were blushing and giggling loudly as Lily Luna stared at them.

"Hey, Big Blaze," Lily Luna shouted to the red-haired boy. "Come over here for a moment, I need to ask you something."

That shut the girls up, and they hurried to the girls' dormitory, still blushing.

So Mikoshiba Seijuro was also called Big Blaze, Makoto thought, as Seijuro strode over to where Lily Luna stood. His hair looked aflame as it caught a stray firework (which, Makoto noticed, didn't seem to burn anything upon contact). Seijuro was slightly taller than him, had golden eyes, and carried himself with an enthusiastic and sturdy lilt in his strides. He looked no older than thirteen or fourteen, he thought. "What is it?" he heard Seijuro ask Lily Luna. "Seems to me you're trolling those girls again." His laugh was very boisterous.

Lily Luna burst out laughing. "I was, actually. They're very taken with you, Big B."

"Stop calling me that," Seijuro said, sounding embarrassed. He caught Makoto staring at them and walked over to shake his hand. "Hey, new blood, eh? What's your name?"

"Tachibana Makoto," he replied, surprised at being noticed again by another of his House's best Quidditch players. "Nice to meet you—"

Seijuro was shaking his hand vigorously. "I'm Seijuro, second year, nice to meet you, too! Is Captain terrorizing you yet?" (Lily Luna grinned.) He then gave Makoto a sort of an appraising look. "You have a good build, Makoto! Are you into sports?"

"I, um, I was a swimmer back in Japan—"

Seijuro nodded and caught Lily Luna's eye. "I was a swimmer, too, before I went to Hogwarts. I only got on the House team as a Chaser this year."

"Really?" said Makoto, his eyes widening in surprise. "You were brilliant out there! That thing you did with your broomstick, it was really good!" Seijuro was really talented, Makoto thought, to be performing such complicated tricks on a broomstick on his first year as a player.

"Was it?" Seijuro scratched his nape sheepishly. "Personally I think there's still a lot of work to be done, but it doesn't hurt that I'm a protégé of one of the best," he pointed at Lily Luna, who was now eyeing Makoto with great interest.

"Are you interested in playing Quidditch, Makoto?" she asked excitedly.

 

 

Not for the first time, Makoto's four-poster didn't seem as inviting as it usually felt. So many things happened that day, and he knew that lying down on his bed wouldn't bring sleep easily. Still, he quickly changed into his pajamas, his heart still racing.

He couldn't believe it. The captain of his House team just asked him about Quidditch. He stammered the whole time he was talking to Lily Luna, but he hoped she got the gist: he sure was interested, and was willing to try out in his second year, as first years weren't allowed yet. Seijuro had wrung his hands again before he left for the boys' dormitory, saying he'd be expecting him next year.

Hadn't he imagined it? Him in scarlet robes and flying? And now he was a step closer to making it all real...

And yet it wouldn't happen.

He smiled a sad little smile at Yukio, who had just leapt onto the bed softly and was nuzzling his nose against Makoto's hand.

The first time he learned Hisoka was sending Haruka to Hogwarts, all he felt was fear and worry. Haruka was, aside from his family, the most constant thing in his life. The prospect of being separated from him was like inviting the idea of an endless stomachache. And so he wrote to McGonagall to request if he could come to Hogwarts, too. He regretted leaving his family behind, but at least, he thought, his parents had Ran and Ren to make them smile everyday. Haru had no one—at least, no one who knew him really well yet, so he accompanied him. That was one of his goals upon going to Hogwarts: to look out for Haruka, to keep him company, to cheer him up and help him make new friends. _And keep him away from too much water_ , he thought, smiling slightly.

Keep company he did. The first weeks at Hogwarts were fascinating and fun—his classes were really interesting (though he was regularly terrified at Potions), he realized not all witches were scary, he got to lounge by the lake with Haruka and Rin during Rin's English tutorial lessons, eating food they brought from the Great Hall. But the enchanting spell of his lessons and the school environ was constantly pierced with the memory of the mysterious letter Rin found in Haruka's book. Unease would always overwhelm him, and there wasn't a day when he didn't think of Haruka's safety.

Because of that, he'd spent a very great deal of his free time in the library. To think, to plan, to calm himself. He actually preferred being there alone. Despite missing their presence, he knew he'd get little work done if Haruka and Rin were there with him, arguing. So far, he'd discovered the uses of a pensieve, how it worked, its limitations. And as soon as they met Haruka next morning, he'd finally share it to him and Rin.

 _Rin was wrong about something_ , he thought. Doing research at the library wasn't unnecessary work. It was an obligation he was bound to do ever since he asked for his parents' permission to go to Hogwarts. His parents weren't telling him anything except Hisoka found a very good job in Tokyo, that it was necessary to leave Haruka, that there was nothing to worry about. He knew, however, that something was wrong. He couldn't place it, couldn't remember when he felt that way. Maybe it was reading Haruka's acceptance letters to both Mahoutokoro and Hogwarts, or the strange feeling he felt at home after Haruka came to live with them (it was as if they were being watched by something or someone). Maybe it was the fact that Nerissa willingly left Haruka alone, she who loved Haruka so greatly. But he _felt_ it. Reading the letter about Brook and death only heightened his misgivings. Seeing Brook with ears almost confirmed his suspicions.

Someone or something was after the Nanases, Haruka specifically.

Of course, he thought as his hand nuzzled Yukio's head, he could be wrong. He could just be imagining it all. What was it that Haruka said? _"Your imagination is what's weird."_ Hopefully, it just was. So when he's back in Japan he'd not have to worry anymore.

Haruka didn't know that he, Makoto, was to return to Iwatobi and transfer to Mahoutokoro after a year. It was part of his deal with McGonagall and his parents. On the promise that he'd only help Haruka adjust to life at a foreign boarding school did they agree to his wish.

But even his parents and McGonagall didn't know his real reason for coming here. He's also at Hogwarts not because he didn't think Haruka could look after himself. Haruka was an independent spirit with a strong will, that much he knew. His best friend would survive anywhere.

_I'm here to find out Uncle Hisoka's real reason for sending Haru away, for choosing Hogwarts over Mahoutokoro._

And he was having answers finally, however disjointed. Brook... the pensieve... shapeshifters... Finding the solution to all these would make his stay at Hogwarts worthwhile and he'd go back with no regrets.

Still, he often imagined how nice it would've felt to spend days at the school unbound by time or worry. Hermione said he was really doing well at Transfiguration. To be able to continue studying it under her tutelage would be great...

He sighed. If he were also at Hufflepuff, he might have discussed these things with Haruka earlier. Wasn't that why he begged the Sorting Hat? More than truly thinking he's not brave enough to be in Gryffindor, he wanted to be always able to talk with Haruka. He missed him, he'd admit. Late night chats on opposite beds, seeing Haruka's annoyed face, their guessing games. Did Haruka miss him, too?

Yukio mewed softly, and Makoto wondered if cats could read people's minds.

 

 

"Got doused in vinegar, I heard," was the first thing Makoto heard next morning. "Hufflepuff's got some mean moves."

"Wah 'appened?" he mumbled sleepily as he opened an eye and glanced at his watch (which, due to yesterday's happenings, he forgot to remove from his wrist). It was six in the morning and a Sunday. He wasn't used to waking up so early.

"'Morn, Tachibana," said the brusque voice of Dugald Foxear, as he raised a cup of coffee to him. He was thickset and burly-looking, with lots of hair. He looked like a mini-Hagrid. He was a very light sleeper and was addicted to coffee. While some of their classmates were wary of him, Makoto knew Dugald was actually kind.

There was a chuckle. "You were early today, Makoto," said Bill Pimpernel, whose voice drifted loudly from the hangings of his four-poster.

"Because you're a right loud bugger, you are," grunted tousle-haired Ed Glen, ripping open his hangings to yawn at them all. "Morning."

Their roommate Robert Brook was still snoring.

"Good morning," Makoto greeted his roommates. "What happened?" he asked more clearly now.

"Someone got bathed in vinegar last night, there at Hufflepuff," supplied Dugald. "Got some coffee this morning and I heard the house-elves talking 'bout it. Who d'you reckon was it?"

"Probably someone foolish enough to forget their password," said Ed, falling back on his covers again.

Bill fluffed up his pillows and arranged them neatly on his bed. "No," he said. "My sister's in Hufflepuff House. They don't have passwords."

Makoto remembered Haruka saying something about the entrance to their common room. "Barrels," he said. "To get to their common room, they have to tap a barrel, I think, and there's a rhythm to it. The vinegar's an added precaution. Haru told me."

"Nanase Haruka? Nanase the knight who saved Princess Rin?" Ed sniggered.

Makoto frowned at this a bit. "Um—"

Bill flung one of his carefully fluffed up pillows on Ed's face. "There, did it for you, Makoto. So someone forgot the rhythm thing, got locked out and doused in vinegar?" he asked Makoto and Dugald as he patted his bedspread flat.

"Probably," said Dugald.

"What about someone tried to sneak into Hufflepuff?" came the muffled voice of Ed.

"And why would someone do that?" demanded Bill, suddenly looking concerned.

"Search me," shrugged Ed. "Maybe to nick something? Your pillow reeks, by the way," he said, throwing the pillow back at Bill.

"Just someone forgetful, I reckon. To be honest I don't know why people would sneak into other Houses in the dead of night," said Dugald.

"Let's say you have a very beautiful girlfriend in Slytherin..." started Ed innocently.

"Well," said Dugald, but then he started laughing, and soon, everyone except Makoto joined in.

 _What if someone indeed tried to break into the Hufflepuff common room?_ he thought worriedly.

 

 

Makoto finally saw Haruka at ten at the morning, about to enter the Hufflepuff common room.

"You're all right!" he gasped. "The news— my roommates told me — someone was barred access to your common room last night — I thought —"

"Of course I'm all right," Haruka snapped at him. "Why weren't you in the Great Hall?"

"Wait, you actually went there today?" he asked, startled. "You _ate_? That's great! I immediately came here after I heard. I was here at around 7" — he pointed at the stack of barrels in a nook by the kitchen corridor — "waiting for you to come out. I didn't know you were up so early. So, have you seen Rin yet, have you talked?"

"Yes," said Haruka simply. "Will you come with me? I need to ask you something. About pensieves."

"Let's call Rin first," he said. "He'll want to know about them, too."

"No need," Haruka said. "Just tell him at lunch."

Makoto found this odd. "Have you really talked with him in the Hall? Haru, look, Rin is sorry for what happened at the Quidditch match. You two need to make up—"

"I said I already talked to him, didn't I?" Haruka sounded severe. "Will you come with me or will you rather talk about him all day?"

Haruka's eyes were the coldest he'd seen all his life, Makoto thought as he stared at him. _This is not the Haru I know._ _He's never like this. His voice can be as icy as he wants, and his actions even colder, but his eyes never looked at me this way._ Feeling a sense of foreboding, he nodded, wondering what made Haruka so angry as they walked past two flights of stairs and entered an abandoned classroom, whose door Haruka locked before rounding on him.

 

 

"Tell all you know," Haruka said in a voice unfamiliar to Makoto. It was a command, loud and ringing, forceful. "The pensieve. You've been helping the boy together with the professor, haven't you?"

Makoto shifted uncomfortably in one of the classroom's armchairs, and his wand poked him painfully in the ribs. "Haru, are you okay?"

"Tell me!" Haruka shouted, advancing on him. "You are his friend, are you not?"

 _Friend of whom?_ "Haru," he said softly, "if this is about Rin..."

For a second, Makoto thought Haruka was only behaving this way because he was jealous of his friendship with Rin. He even looked odd. Indeed, Haruka's eyes were bulging slightly and his face had a waxy look to it, and his lips were curled in a slight sneer. For a moment, Makoto would have liked to smile, to hug Haruka, to tell him that there was no need to feel troubled, because he was irreplaceable, because he still remained his best friend, one of the most wonderful people he'd known. But as a hand closed around his throat, stiff and cold, ice seemed to fill his body.

The person in front of him wasn't Haruka at all.

"N-no!" Makoto yelled, fighting to wrench the hand away from his neck. He kicked the Haruka impostor hard in the leg and scrambled toward the door. It seemed to be locked from the outside. What spell was it, the one used for locks, he thought frantically, pulling out his wand from the waistband of his jeans. He knew he read about it once, or twice, he'd read all his schoolbooks already...

The impostor was gaining on him, and Makoto felt a hatred so deep when he saw the ugly look on the face that was Haruka's. Where was the real Haruka, and what had this impostor done to him?

" _Alohomora_!" he remembered, and he pointed his wand at the door. There was a loud click, the door swung forward, and Makoto ran toward it, but a wall of water appeared in front of it, and soon it was sealed shut again. He stood rooted where he was, half a meter away from escape.

A voice spoke behind him, this time deep, reassuring, yet still familiar. "You know too much." Makoto turned and to his utter horror, saw Haruka was gone. He was now facing Professor Brook. Bald, scarred, and earless, the impostor spoke again. "Is my transformation to par now? I seem to remember you saw me during an unfinished one." He touched his ears lightly.

"Who are you?" He fought to keep his voice composed. If he would die now, then at least he had to know the answers to his many questions. "Where's Haru and Professor Brook?"

"Who am I," the impostor seemed to wonder. "You helped me once, mortal."

"When?"

"It was an afternoon, and I was drowning," said the impostor. "At least, I was pretending to be. Those armbands were a plague—"

Makoto's legs seemed to be wasting away. "You're Hitomi?" he asked weakly.

"Am I her? Maybe, I could be seen that way." Makoto saw Brook's features melt like wax, turn liquid and clear like water, and soon a pale girl with amber eyes and greenish-brown hair appeared in his place. "This is the form I assume on land, although I am usually older than this."

"So you weren't really drowning? Why do it, then?"

"To lure Nerissa's son to this," said Hitomi, brushing back her long hair to reveal a white pearl on black twine hanging on her neck. "It looks normal to you, I assume. But it is a pearl imbued with powers of my kind, meant to help us find her son. When Haruka held this, we confirmed he was alive, and years of work, of finding where they hid, all of those ended in success. I must say my thanks to you, of course, for helping us."

He remembered the pearl necklace was collected by the police, but from all he was seeing now, he could see how easy it was for Hitomi to assume the form of a policeman and get it back.

He felt like he was going to be sick. So he started it all, by helping one innocent-looking girl about to drown...

"You kept watch on my house," he said. It wasn't a question.

"Only because mortals held your place with a magic I cannot penetrate."

"You sent Haru the letter."

"Yes. It was a warning I'd dispose of Brook if he keeps being with him. That mortal knows too much of undine lore to begin with, and the way he's assisting him with memories, it is unacceptable."

"You tried to enter Hufflepuff's common room last night," he said again.

"Oh, I did. I heard your little squabble at the Queeddits pitch, I did, and it disappointed me so. I had to act. The boy was giving you information."

"Haru? No, he was not!"

Makoto hoped he was buying time with his questions, but for what, he only felt despair. Neither Haruka or Rin knew where he was. Still...

"If you were really intent on him finding that necklace, why set us up that way? Why not just force the pearl on Haru's hand? You already seemed to know he was in Iwatobi before he even laid a hand on it."

"Our magic is stronger in the water," Hitomi said simply. "We could only confirm he is indeed Nerissa's son by making sure he gets to the sea."

"Haru was underwater for three hours. You could have hurt him during those hours, but you didn't. What did you want from him?"

"We tried to keep him for more, to break the protective bonds that seemed to surround him as he swam, but we could not, and we had to let him go first. Your friend is a peril to the Ways," Hitomi said grimly, and he has to be sacrificed. Only his death shall—"

"What? No!" Makoto brandished his wand. "You can't take Haru away. Please don't. I won't—I won't let you."

Hitomi laughed, and it was a musical, lovely sound, an odd thing to hear after all he had listened to. Then she spoke again, a certain menace in her tone, "You are forcing me to show my true form, foolish boy."

She seemed to melt again, her features rearranging into one of the most beautiful and horrible beings Makoto had ever seen. Her limbs became slender and liquid; her skin turned clear, bloodless, and bright; her eyes, already cold, turned into glassy amber; and her long hair became a thick mass of brown-green seaweed, braided elegantly.

"My true name is Lamine. "I am the Kelp Undine. You know more than you are allowed and you are getting in my way." With that, her right hand transformed into a thin, sharp sliver of ice which she thrust into Makoto's chest, with a breath of the barest of apologies.

 

 

The door was torn off its hinges and a large black dog entered the classroom, barely restrained by its master. Sabainu bared his fangs against Lamine and the real Haruka had whipped out his wand, his eyes fearfully looking at Makoto's body, which was lying supine and bleeding on the floor.

"What is that thing?" shrieked Lamine, gliding away from Sabainu's rapidly-snapping mouth. She then saw Haruka and smiled. "You have come to me, dear boy."

"It was you," said Haruka. "From my second meeting with Professor Brook onwards, it had been you, impersonating him and feeding me terrible and fake memories!"

"Can you be certain about that?" said Lamine, smiling more wryly. "How can you be sure I was not him since the first one?"

"The first one was a real memory," said Haruka decisively.

"Are you sure? Do you actually believe your father was able to foil the Ways and give you a soul without resorting to murder, to the borrowing of others' blood? You don't think Brook was an accomplice to trap you in this place and bring you to us?"

"Where is he?" asked Haruka, knowing the answer before it came.

"Dead," said Lamine carelessly. "That boy," she said, pointing to Makoto, "saw me once during an incomplete shapeshifting. There can only be one of us, will you not agree? I _had_ to kill all doubts."

"You could have just told me," said Haruka, his voice breaking. "You just needed to tell me I had to go with you and I would. Professor Brook was a good man. And my friend—"

"Ha...ru," gasped Makoto. "Leave t-this place, now..."

All of them did not seem to notice Sabainu was gone.

"He is a meddlesome shadow that needs to be rid of," said Lamine, looking at Makoto coldly. "You say that to me now, but you were not entirely cooperative during those pensieve sessions! I told you not to speak of them but I discovered your friend was looking for information!"

"He was only looking for information on pensieves, not at all on undines! I haven't told them anything as promised!"

Lamine looked back and forth Makoto and Haruka. "Still, the Ways state our existence be not known, and he now knows far too much, unfortunately..."

"Please," Haruka said, and Makoto felt a pain greater than his wound, knowing what Haruka would say next. "Take me. Just leave him alone, I assure you he won't talk, just take me."

"Ha...ru...ka... No..."

Lamine regarded them for a moment. "I expect the Sea King will consider this mission successful if I bring you to him. All right, then." She stretched out her right hand. Thick ropes of water flowed from her fingers and bound Haruka's hands.

"Let's g—the thing, the thing is gone!" Lamine suddenly said, looking around for Sabainu.

There was a guttural, snarling noise in the air as Sabainu came bounding back into the room. Makoto saw three powerful jets of light, heard a soul-splitting scream, before finally he gave in to darkness, whispering Haruka's name.

 

 

The room smelled of chocolate and bananas. Makoto tried to open his eyes and saw a room flooded with warm, bright sunlight. He closed them again. _Where am I?_

"He's finally awake," said a voice curiously identical to Rin's. "He's awake, right?" Whoever he was talking to didn't reply, but Makoto felt a warm hand close tightly over his own.

"He still needs plenty of rest," said a strict voice he didn't recognize. "You can talk with him now, but don't pepper the boy with questions."

"Yes, Madam Pomfrey," said Rin.

There was a clatter of metal and he heard something being rolled away. A door clicked shut, and Rin talked again. "Hi, Makoto. Can you hear me? Haru and I are here, we visited you again. He insisted on bringing you mackerel but he already brought you that for the past three days, when you weren't awake..."

He tried to open his eyes again, and now found the light not as blinding as before. He looked around. He must have been in the hospital wing, he realized. He looked over to the source of the voices and saw Haruka sitting on a chair, holding his hand, and Rin sitting on its armrest, smiling brightly at him.

"Rin, Haru," he said, heaving with effort to sit. "What happened?"

"You were attacked by a shapeshifting water goddess monster thing," said Rin. He looked at Haru. "That sounds weirder when I put it like that. She's an undine. Anyway," Rin continued, "you've been unconscious for four days. Things have settled now. Granger, Snape, and Flitwick came running to that classroom and simultaneously hit her with spells. Lamine is now in the custody of Professor Hermione.""

Remembering it all, Makoto gripped Haruka's hand tightly. "She wasn't able to take you away."

"No," said Haruka. "Sabainu saved us. He must have called the teachers' attention."

"Sabainu, your dog?" Makoto asked in amazement.

"Yeah." Now that Makoto was awake, Haruka seemed to be bursting with words. "He was actually the one that led me to you. That morning I was just in my room, but he kept howling and howling at me until I came out of the common room. Seemed to sense where you were and what was happening. If if wasn't for him, you would've—" He couldn't seem to continue.

"Where is he now? Is he—is he okay?"

"He's in my room, still asleep."

Makoto chuckled at this. "For a dog always asleep, he's very perceptive. I promise to save up my allowance and buy him mackerel treats."

"Father told me Sabainu's my guardian. I think I know now what he meant by that."

"Yeah," Makoto agreed. "He doesn't really seem like an ordinary dog to me."

"Yeah," nodded Rin, who in the past days had spent a fair amount of time in the library to read up on Japanese creatures, and realized Haruka's dog was an inugami. "It's not normal for dogs to eat too much mackerel, is it?"

Haruka raised an eyebrow at him, and suddenly Rin burst out laughing. Makoto and Haruka smiled. Then there was silence, followed by the three of them saying one word at the same time:

"Sorry."

"What?" said Rin.

"You go first," said Makoto.

"You do that," said Haruka.

"Fine," said Rin. "Let me start. I'm sorry I'm a selfish prat too concerned with my frustrations of Quidditch to notice something dark was happening. I'm sorry I called you thick, Haru. I mean, you're okay, you really are. Sometimes you weird me out, I'll admit, but you're loads better than any names Serafina and her gang call you and I swear I'll help put a stop to them. I said this before, and I'm saying it again: Sorry for yelling at you, Makoto. You're really kind and you tried to patch me and Haru up and thanks." His face was quickly turning into the same shade as his hair and he stopped talking.

"I guess I should be more willing to take risks," said Makoto. "Sorry for holding back and not telling you things I already know. I was afraid it wasn't the right time yet, scared you'll get angry with me."

Haruka took quite a while before speaking. "I didn't want you two to get into trouble," he said, the same words he spoke at the Quidditch pitch. Encouraged by Makoto and Rin's smiles, he continued:

"I guess it's time to tell you, so you can avoid me. I'm part-water spirit."

He looked at Rin and Makoto expectantly.

Makoto nodded.

Rin said, "Okay."

"Didn't you hear what I just said? I'm part-water spirit." Haruka said the last two words slowly, like he was teaching a three-year old an object's name.

Again, Makoto and Rin just nodded at him.

"Are you being stupid?" grumbled Haruka, looking frustrated now. "My mother was a former undine who sacrificed immortality to live on land! That's why I'm being hunted! There's something wrong about my soul! I'm part-water spirit!"

"We know," said Rin and Makoto.

"What?" Haruka looked thoroughly surprised.

"We know you're part-water being."

"You know? And is it—is it okay with you?"

Rin rolled his eyes. "It's painfully obvious, Haru."

"You don't hate me for it?"

"Why would we hate you for it?" It was Makoto's turn to look shocked now.

"I'm different," said Haruka bitterly.

"No, you're just Haru to me," said Makoto. Rin nodded vigorously.

Haruka looked lost. "Makoto almost died because of me!"

"Seriously, Haru. Do you want me to take back what I said about you not being thick?" snorted Rin. "I thought we came to terms already."

Haruka limped on his chair. "Since when did you know?"

"Quite a while," said Makoto cheerfully. "A few years. It was just a hunch I made when you fell asleep on the bathtub with the faucet on and didn't drown. From then on, I tried not to worry too much when you're taking long underwater."

"I made a theory during Potions," piped in Rin. "When we made the Seestern Solution. Haven't I told you my dad was a fisherman? Well, he caught a mermaid once, and that's where I based it all from."

Haruka seemed to be on the brink of speech. In the end he just looked at them. They didn't hug. They didn't touch. Haruka just stood there, face tense and hopeful and glad and familiar. For Makoto, this was more than enough. For Rin, it was a step closer to thoroughly unboxing a mystery, a start to becoming more and more captivated with a sight he never knew he'd encounter.

The door opened and Madam Pomfrey came bustling in. "Visiting hours are over. Off you go!"

 

 

After Makoto was discharged from the hospital wing, he was summoned together with Haruka to the headmistress' office.

"How did it go?" asked Rin anxiously after Haruka and Makoto finished talking with McGonagall. He was holding a copy of _Berna Gabble's Booky-Talky of Basic English_ on one hand and a platter of bacon sandwiches on the other.

"My parents' pact with Hogwarts involved Brook showing me their memories in secrecy. Now that he's gone, I'm not bound here anymore," said Haruka in a strangely distant voice.

"What does that mean?" asked Rin again.

"They're sending me home," said Haruka.

"But—but it's not even December yet," said Rin, looking terrified.

"No, they'll let me finish the year," Haruka replied. "Then I'll transfer to Mahoutokoro."

Rin went pale. "What about you, Makoto?"

Makoto knew there was no point in keeping it all secret now. "My parents only allowed me a year here, too. I was originally down for Mahoutokoro. I only came here to look after Haru." Hearing this, Haruka gave him a glare. It was so familiar that Makoto smiled fondly. "But that's why I'm studying really hard, you see. If my grades are good maybe McGonagall will allow me to stay for a few years more."

"You're leaving," was all Rin said.

"No, I don't think so," whispered Haruka, looking determined.

Rin faced them squarely. "If you come back next year, I'll show you a sight you've never seen before."

Makoto and Haruka exchanged glances.

"You already have," said Haruka.

They walked to the lake and settled under a nice and shady beech tree. It was time for another of Rin's English lessons.

 

 

 

 

_-End of Part One-_

* * *

_Chapter 13, RAN AND REN'S PROPHECIES:_ _Haruka and Makoto return home._ _Nagisa is determined to go to Hogwarts, but McGonagall doesn't reply._ _In his introductory chapter, Rei fails spectacularly at something._ _Postscript at derasorea.wordpress.com._


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